Sunday, January 03, 2010

Explicit Biblical Evidence of Men Helping to Save Themselves or Participating in Their Own Salvation (Which is Always Enabled by God's Grace)

St. Paul was vehemently opposed to the Protestant faith alone (sola fide) doctrine and to monergism

Acts 2:38-40 And Peter said to them, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. [39] For the promise is to you and to your children and to all that are far off, every one whom the Lord our God calls to him." [40] And he testified with many other words and exhorted them, saying, "Save yourselves from this crooked generation."

Romans 13:11-14 Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; [12] the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; [13] let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. [14] But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

1 Corinthians 9:22-27 To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. [23] I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. [24] Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. [25] Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. [26] Well, I do not run aimlessly, I do not box as one beating the air; [27] but I pommel my body and subdue it, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

Philippians 2:12-13 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; [13] for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Philippians 3:7-16 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. [8] Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, based on law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith; [10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that if possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. [12] Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. [13] Brethren, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, [14] I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. [15] Let those of us who are mature be thus minded; and if in anything you are otherwise minded, God will reveal that also to you. [16] Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

2 Thessalonians 2:13 . . . God chose you from the beginning to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.

1 Timothy 2:15 Yet woman will be saved through bearing children, if she continues in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.

1 Timothy 4:16 Take heed to yourself and to your teaching; hold to that, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.

2 Timothy 3:15 . . . the sacred writings which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.[we do the work of reading Scripture and this in turn can save us, so we helped save ourselves by reading it]

Hebrews 6:9-11 Though we speak thus, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things that belong to salvation. [10] For God is not so unjust as to overlook your work and the love which you showed for his sake in serving the saints, as you still do. [11] And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness in realizing the full assurance of hope until the end,

1 Peter 2:2 Like newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation;

2 Peter 1:10 Therefore, brethren, be the more zealous to confirm your call and election, for if you do this you will never fall;

You have nothing to fear, despite Adomnan's name calling, ad hominem, and insulting slander. (calling them hacks and charlatans)

A "Fundamentalist" is usually known as the Bob Jones/independent Baptists movements, and none of these are part of those churches, although we believe in "the fundamental" doctrines of the Christian faith as opposed to liberal anti-supernatural scholarship.

Fitzmeyer is a good scholar (and writes some things against Roman Catholic dogma); and so is N.T. Wright, -- Wright is good against the Jesus Seminar, but wrong on "the New Perspective on Paul".

John Piper has answered and refuted Wright on the "New Perspective on Paul" in his book, The Future of Justification

www.desiringGod.org - John Piper is pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, part of the Baptist General Conference, not an "independent/fundamentalist Baptist" Church.

www.gty.org - John McArthur started out early in his career as associated with the independent baptist movement, but he was never "KJV only" (one strand of the "fightin fundies"), and he has moved away from them in several very important areas. (His defense of Lordship Salvation and Calvinism)

Adomnan: No need. You summarize and reproduce all their "best" arguments here. For example, that "work out/work in" stuff re Phil 2:12 came from Piper, right?

Ken: You have nothing to fear,

Adomnan:...unless you find stupidity scary.

Ken: A "Fundamentalist" is usually known as the Bob Jones/independent Baptists movements,

Adomnan: As I define it, a Fundamentalist is someone who believes in penal substitution and six literal days of creation ("and he rested on the seventh"). After all, I have to call you people something. "Christian" won't do, because you aren't that. Maybe I should just write "you people."

Ken: Wright is good against the Jesus Seminar, but wrong on "the New Perspective on Paul".

Adomnan: Sez who?

Ken: John Piper has answered and refuted Wright on the "New Perspective on Paul" in his book, The Future of Justification.

Ken: John McArthur .....was never "KJV only" (one strand of the "fightin fundies"), and he has moved away from them in several very important areas. (His defense of Lordship Salvation and Calvinism). Sam Storms...R. C. Sproul...Justin Taylor...Triablogue.

I am a Reformed Protestant (Calvinist) who is currently studying the early Church Fathers and seriously considering the claims of the Catholic Church. You are not helping "Catholic-curious" Protestants AT ALL by describing Godly, learned men (knowledgable of the Biblical languages and serious about serving God), such as John Piper and R.C. Sproul, as "hacks" and "not Christian." You obviously haven't read anything that these men have written, so please do not ignorantly deny the reality of their Christian faith. Pope Benedict XVI would never be so rash as to do such a thing.

But I wouldn't call them "hacks" because of this, just . . . fundamentalists. The category encompasses a much wider field than KJV-Only, who are mostly a bunch of nuts, far to the right of James White.

Everyone draws the line as to who they will interact with. R. C. Sproul disagreed with James White as to debating Catholics. Sproul thought it gave them too much credence.

By the same token, I no longer attempt to debate anti-Catholics, because their position is so absurd that it doesn't deserve any attention.

Some people draw that line at YEC, etc. But YEC is one of the signs of fundamentalism in any event.

Even William Jennings Bryan of Scopes Trial fame wasn't that fundamentalist.

When you have no case, give your opponent a homework assignment. That is, "I can't refute anything you said specifically Dave, so I will drop a data-dump grenade of links and assume some of the shrapnel will apply to the topic at hand, and bid everyone go out, read them, and make my case for me." Frankly, one might as well go to an anti-pornography forum and link nude pics.

Christopher Lake: You are not helping "Catholic-curious" Protestants AT ALL by describing Godly, etc.

Adomnan: Okay. I'll let up on them since it bothers you so much. Dave doesn't share my views about this anyway, and so you shouldn't "blame" my observations on him or his blog.

I have read bits and pieces of the work of several of these men, and so I am familiar with its general content.

I believe Sproul doesn't consider orhodox (post-Tridentine) Catholics to be Christians, which is apparently fine with you, or at most a peccadillo. Among supporters of these "Fundamentalist" types, or whatever you want to call them, speculation about the Christian status of Catholics is considered quite acceptable, while any questioning of their own Christian status is beyond the pale. Double standard.

I don't know what Piper's view of the Christian status of Catholics is; i.e., whether he falls into what Dave calls the "anti-Catholic category."

Adomnan: I have to call you people something. "Christian" won't do, because you aren't that.

Dave: What are they, then, and why are they not Christian?

Adomnan: I've aired my views about this before, and I won't belabor them. I know you disagree. I'm just expressing my own private opinion. not any official teaching of the Church.

The doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement presupposes a false image of God. God is depicted as a judge who condemns the innocent (that is, Jesus Christ). However, the Bible tells us that a judge who "acquits the guilty and condemns the innocent" (Prov. 17:15) is "an abomination to the Lord." Thus, the object of worship of believers in penal substitution cannot be the God of the Bible, the Father of Jesus Christ. Since they disbelieve in the God of the Bible and posit another deity (as seen by his attributes), they cannot be Christians.

Ken: You stoop down to Ken's anti-Catholic level if you start defining people as non-Christians, like he does with us.

Adomnan: I just don't believe they are Christians, and I've given my reason. What else can I say? Their idea of God differs too radically from the Biblical idea of God. They ascribe unrighteousness to God.

Ken: "Fundamentalist" I could see, in many cases. Steve Hays, for example, from Triablogue, believes that the earth is 10,000 years old.

Dave: But I wouldn't call them "hacks" because of this, just . . . fundamentalists.

Adomnan: I call them "hacks" because they don't do any insightful or original research as scholars. They simply take Scripture and fit it into Fundamentalist presuppositions in a Procrustean way.

Can any reader of these writers and preachers give an example of something they learned from them that isn't a Fundamentalist platitude or else a bit of sophistry intended to explain why a given scripture, regardless of what it seems to say, is really just corroborating some Fundamentalist (or "Calvinist") platitude?

Scott: When you have no case, give your opponent a homework assignment.

Adomnan: Good point, Scott. Ken frequently tries to direct us to website material that doesn't actually address the points at issue or does so only tangentially. And his on-line gurus cannot be cross-examined or drawn into dialogue. They don't converse; they sermonize.

But there's another reason there's no point in wasting one's time on Ken's links. Ken repeats here whatever of their analysis he finds relevant to the issue at hand. The problem with this for Ken is that we can respond to him.

It is not a matter of not having a case; it is mostly a matter of time and space to adequately cover the issues. I have actually answered much of what Adomnan and Dave have said, we but just disagree with each other.

Nick Needham also has a chapter on "Justification in the Early Church Fathers" in Justification in Perspective: Historical Developments and Contemporary Challenges. Bruce L. McCormack, Editor, Rutherford House Publishers/Baker Academic, 2006.

No, you have skewed and misrepresented the doctrine. (we debated this issue before, several times here, but it deserves a rebuttal here.)

The eternal Son of God voluntarily was willing to take the punishment. So, Jesus being God - God Himself was willing and voluntarily took the justice, the punishment of our sins. God the Father was willing to justly punish the sin, because Christ became the willing victim and sacrifice, out of pure love for sinners.

God did not condemn the innocent; rather He himself willingly took the punishment. You forget that Jesus is God, so if God Himself took the punishment, willingly, that it is not the same as Proverbs 17:15, for that is speaking about man doing that to man. Since God took His own punishment; the Father and the Son agreeing together out of love for sinners and justice against sin; and Christ took on the sin; then it is not unjust. It is pure love and justice together.

"The Lord was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, . . . Isaiah 53:10

Ken: The eternal Son of God voluntarily was willing to take the punishment.

Adomnan: You mean "to be punished by the Father?" Where is this in the Bible?

Besides, it wouldn't matter whether, as in your scheme, Jesus willed to "take the punishment." Punishing the innocent is an abomination whether the person punished is willing to take it or not. The crime is the judge's.

Ken: So, Jesus being God - God Himself was willing and voluntarily took the justice, the punishment of our sins.

Adomnan: Thus, God punished Himself? Who obtains justice by punishing himself for crimes commmited by others?

Ken: God the Father was willing to justly punish the sin,

Adomnan: Since when is it just to punish Bob for Bill's sin?

Ken: because Christ became the willing victim and sacrifice, out of pure love for sinners.

Adomnan: Sacrificial victims are not punished as such. Never have been. Never will be. You think a "sacrifice" is punishing a victim. No. It's giving a gift to God, which He can then share with us. YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT SACRIFICE IS! Wake up!

Ken: God did not condemn the innocent;

Adomnan: So Jesus Christ wasn't innocent? Why does 2Cor 5:21 say He was "the sinless one"?

Ken: rather He himself willingly took the punishment.

Adomnan: "Rather"? "Rather" implies a contrast: Christ wasn't innocent; "rather he took the punishment." This doesn't even make sense.

Ken: You forget that Jesus is God,

Adomnan: I have "forgotten" nothing. The fact that you blame it on God doesn't make penal substitution anything other than a load of absurdity. It just makes it blasphemous absurdity.

Ken: if God Himself took the punishment, willingly,

Adomnan: So we're back to getting "justice" by punishing yourself. When did that ever happen?

Ken: that it is not the same as Proverbs 17:15, for that is speaking about man doing that to man.

Adomnan: So abominations aren't abominations if God does them (according to your blasphemy)? Can you identify some other abominations in the Bible that God commits, or is this the only one? Can He commit all abominations in your theology, or are some acceptable while others are beyond the pale?

Proverbs 17:15 refers to the worst crime that a JUDGE can commit: acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent. God will of course be a righteous judge, which means that he won't violate the most fundamental duty of a judge, set forth in Prov 17:15.

Ken: Since God took His own punishment;

Adomnan: Under what system of justice does one get justice by punishing oneself? Show me this principle in the Bible. This is nonsense on the face of it.

Ken: the Father and the Son agreeing together out of love for sinners and justice against sin; and Christ took on the sin;

Adomnan: Great! We haven't caught bin Laden, and so let's just grab some guy off the street and execute him for what bin Laden did. That would be justice, wouldn't it? The principle you are enunciating: It doesn't matter who gets punished for a crime, as long as someone is punished (even an innocent man)! Are you so blind that you can't see how insane this is?

"Justice against sin" indeed! As if it's "sin" that needs to be punished, an abstract concept, rather than sinners! You can't punish an abstraction, Ken. You can't punish an act itself, only the perpetrator of the act.

Ken: "The Lord was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, . . . Isaiah 53:10

Adomnan: And the Book of Job says the Lord crushed Job, put him to grief, even though Job was innocent. So was Job's "crushing" a punishment? Was Job punished? The Bible says he wasn't. If crushing Job wasn't punishment, then neither was the "crushing" of the Servant of Isaiah.

I actually did look up one of Ken's links. This is the question that Piper would ask the Pope, if he could: "Do you teach that we should rely entirely on the righteousness of Christ imputed to us by faith alone as the ground of God being 100% for us, after which necessary sanctification comes? Do you teach that?"

Hey, I'll do Piper one better. I'll have him ask St. Paul this question.

Piper: "Do you teach that we should rely entirely on the righteousness of Christ imputed to us by faith alone...?"

St. Paul: No, as you can see by reading my letter to the Romans, the only passage in which I use a word that can be translated as "impute," I don't write that what you call "Christ's righteousness" is imputed to anyone, I write that one's "faith" is imputed to one as righteousness. Obviously, your faith is not the same as "Christ's righteousness." Can't you read?

Also, I never refer at all to "Christ's righteousness." Where do you get this stuff? I frequently speak of the righteousness of God, but this of course doesn't refer to Christ's personal righteousness but to God's faithfulness to His promise to save the Gentiles through the progeny of Abraham (namely, Jesus Christ).

So, I don't say that anything is imputed to us "by faith" or "by faith alone," I say that faith itself is imputed to us as righteousness.

You're tragically wrong, Mr. Piper. You preach a false gospel. If you want to know what the true gospel is then 1) read me more carefully and 2) go ask the Pope, the successor of that pillar of the Church, my good friend Peter, on whom Jesus Christ has built His church and to whom He gave the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.

Adomnan: Do I have to read the Book of Mormon? Do I have to read every piece of junk ever written? (Actually, I have perused a few bits of Webster's book, enough to know it wasn't worthwhile to read any more.)

Adomnan: So Jesus Christ wasn't innocent? Why does 2Cor 5:21 say He was "the sinless one"?

Yes, Jesus was innocent, but the sin was imputed to Him - and He willingly took it ("not My will but Thy Be done" Luke 22:42; "He who knew no sin, became sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him" 2 Cor. 5:21

Galatians 3:10-13For as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO DOES NOT ABIDE BY ALL THINGS WRITTEN IN THE BOOK OF THE LAW, TO PERFORM THEM."

Now that no one is justified by the Law before God is evident; for, "THE RIGHTEOUS MAN SHALL LIVE BY FAITH."

However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, "HE WHO PRACTICES THEM SHALL LIVE BY THEM."

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us--for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE"--

The imputation of Christ's righteousness to our account is a theological deduction from putting together all the relevant verses. See the article I linked above to many passages. (some of them I have mentioned here.)

We are the guilty ones.We deserved to be punished.Christ was innocent, sinless.Christ died in our place.Christ "became sin" for us.The righteous died for the unrighteous.By faith we become the righteousness of God in Him.Therefore, the righteousness of Christ (the just, righteous) was imputed to us, the unrighteous, unjust - 1 Peter 3:18It is credited, imputed, counted to us by faith; as Romans 4:1-16 says.

The propitiation was a satisfaction of God's justice - Romans 3:24-26 - that He may be both just and the justifier of those that have faith

Romans 3:24-26being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;

25whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed;

for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Adomnan: Oh, where does the Bible teach this? Where does the Bible teach that X's sin can be imputed to Y? Chapter and verse, please. Aren't people responsible for their own sins?

Ken: ("not My will but Thy Be done" Luke 22:42;

Adomnan: This, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with penal substitution.

Ken: "He who knew no sin, became sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him" 2 Cor. 5:21

Adomnan: "Sin" here means "sin offering," as it does in the Septuagint and in Romans 8. So Paul is saying, "He who knew no sin became a sin offering." Sin is not transferred to a "sin offering," only to a scapegoat. Therefore, this verse proves that sin was NOT transferred to Christ.

The "we" in "we might become the righteousness of God in Christ" does not refer to "we Christians," but to the same "we" as in the rest of this passage; i.e., to Paul and those with him who are preaching the gospel. The "righteousness of God" refers, as ALWAYS in Paul, to God's fidelity to his promise to save, His saving righteousness. Thus, the verse means: The sinless one became a sin offering so that I and my fellow preachers of the Gospel could proclaim to you God's fidelity to His promise to save you in Christ."

It has absolutely NOTHING to do with so-called "penal substitution." There is no mention of any "punishment" in fact.

Ken: Galatians 3:10-13For as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO DOES NOT ABIDE BY ALL THINGS WRITTEN IN THE BOOK OF THE LAW, TO PERFORM THEM."

Adomnan: Why did you cite this? This passage has precisely nothing to do with "penal substitution." It simply says that those who are circumcised and follow the Torah, the Jewish Law, are under a curse: "as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse." Neither you, nor I, nor any Gentile follows the Jewish Law, and so this verse has no application to us.

Ken: However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, "HE WHO PRACTICES THEM SHALL LIVE BY THEM."

Adomnan: Thanks for the warning. I won't become Jewish. Now, what does this have to do with penal substitution?

Ken: Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us--for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE"--

Adomnan: Is it your point that Christ must have had sin imputed to him because He was "cursed," or "a curse," under the Jewish Law? I don't know because you don't say. I have to guess. Well, if so, you're wrong. A hanged man was a curse whether he was hanged because he was guilty or was just strung up by brigands. The "curse" had nothing to do with the guilt or innocence of the hanged man. Jesus Christ was a curse UNDER THE LAW because he was hanged, not because he was guilty or had sin "imputed to him."

Ken: "I think we hashed this out before with over 100 comments maybe a year ago or 8 months ago?

Adomnan: Yes. You gave up then because you couldn't defend your absurd position. You told us to just go read Piper.

Adomnan’s hypothetical St. Paul: No, as you can see by reading my letter to the Romans, the only passage in which I use a word that can be translated as "impute," I don't write that what you call "Christ's righteousness" is imputed to anyone, I write that one's "faith" is imputed to one as righteousness. Obviously, your faith is not the same as "Christ's righteousness." Can't you read?

the real Paul: Yes, as you can see by reading my letter to the Romans, and the rest of the relevant verses in all the Bible on this issue. That Christ, the innocent one, the sinless one, died in our place is clear – He willingly took the punishment/justice out of love for us. That righteousness of His is credited to us by faith alone, apart from works.

Also, I never refer at all to "Christ's righteousness." Where do you get this stuff? From Romans 4:24-25 and Romans 5:9 and 5:17-21 and I Peter 3:18 and 2 Cor. 5:21; among many other verses.

I frequently speak of the righteousness of God, Yes, is not Christ God in the flesh?

but this of course doesn't refer to Christ's personal righteousness How do you know? Romans 5:18 “through one act of righteousness”

but to God's faithfulness to His promise to save the Gentiles through the progeny of Abraham (namely, Jesus Christ).

It includes that, but much more also. Romans 5:18 -So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men.” Others too numerous to keep typing out.

If you want to know what the true gospel is then 1) read me more carefully and no, rather, Tell Adomnan to read more carefully and do some good exegesis.

2) go ask the Pope, the successor of that pillar of the Church, my good friend Peter, on whom Jesus Christ has built His church and to whom He gave the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.

the Pope is the not the successor of the pillar of the church at all. Peter said, “Christ died for sins, the just for the unjust” ( I Peter 3:18) and Peter also told us to keep reading the Scriptures, his letters (2 Peter 3:1; 1:12-21) and Paul letters. ( 2 Peter 3:16). If the papal doctrines were true, Peter would have written about it in his second letter, before he died.

Adomnan: Yes. You gave up then because you couldn't defend your absurd position. You told us to just go read Piper.

No, I gave up because we covered everything pretty much for a long time and I didn't have time to keep arguing with you. I also gave up because you are entrenched in your understanding of it. Only God can open your eyes.

Ken: The imputation of Christ's righteousness to our account is a theological deduction from putting together all the relevant verses.

Adomnan: No it isn't. It's a blasphemous and absurd lie that directly contradicts the Bible and every principle taught in the Bible, a doctrine of demons.

Ken: We are the guilty ones.We deserved to be punished.Christ was innocent, sinless.

Adomnan: This much is true.

Ken: Christ died in our place.

Adomnan: False. The Bible teaches that Christ died for us, for our sake. It does not teach that He died "in our place." If X dies "in the place of Y," that implies that Y doesn't die. We die. Therefore, Christ did not die "in our place."

Ken: "Christ "became sin" for us.

Adomnan: Christ "became a sin offering for us." I hope you're not going to base your entire doctrine on a very questionable interpretation of a single word in the Bible. Besides, you heretics do not teach that Christ literally "became sin," but that sin was merely "imputed" to him, which is very different. So this verse does not support your doctrine no matter how interpreted.

Ken: The righteous died for the unrighteous.

Adomnan: True. The Catholic faith teaches this, and it in no way implies penal substitution.

Ken: By faith we become the righteousness of God in Him.

Adomnan: This is not in the Bible. Paul writes "so that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ." He does not mention "faith" in this verse. That's your "fix." I exegeted this verse above.

Ken: Therefore, the righteousness of Christ (the just, righteous) was imputed to us, the unrighteous, unjust - 1 Peter 3:18It is credited, imputed, counted to us by faith; as Romans 4:1-16 says.

Adomnan: Ha,ha! The rabbit is pulled out of the hat. Of course, I Peter 3:18 says nothing about Christ's righteousness being imputed to anyone. You just made that up. Similarly, Rom 4:1-16 says that faith is imputed as righteousness, and Paul never mentions "Christ's righteousness" at all! Hey, Ken, our faith is imputed. Our faith is NOT Christ's righhteousness. They are two different things. Hello? Hello? Anyone there?

Ken: the real Paul: Yes, as you can see by reading my letter to the Romans, and the rest of the relevant verses in all the Bible on this issue. That Christ, the innocent one, the sinless one, died in our place is clear – He willingly took the punishment/justice out of love for us. That righteousness of His is credited to us by faith alone, apart from works.

Adomnan: Let the readers judge whose Paul is more real. Where does Paul say that God imputed sins to Christ and punished Him? Chapter and verse please.

Where does Paul mention Christ's righteousness? Chapter and verse please.

Where does Paul say that Christ's righteousness is "credited to us"? I read in Rom 4 that our FAITH is credited to us as righteousness.

Ken (in response to my query about where Paul refers to Christ's righteousness:) From Romans 4:24-25 and Romans 5:9 and 5:17-21 and I Peter 3:18 and 2 Cor. 5:21; among many other verses.

Adomnan: What are you talking about? NONE of these verses refer to "Christ's righteousness." You're a liar.

Ken, quoting me: (The Bible) frequently speaks of the righteousness of God, Ken: Yes, is not Christ God in the flesh?

Adomnan: The righteousness of God is God's fidelity to his promise to save the Gentiles through the progeny of Abraham. This is not the same thing as Christ's personal righteousness, which Paul never mentions.

You are defending the indefensible absurdity that Paul teaches that Christ's righteousness is imputed to us when 1) Paul never mentions Christ's righteousness and 2) Paul says that faith, not Christ's righteousness, is imputed to us as righteousness.

You are saying that Paul taught as the gospel something he never mentioned and never alluded to. Do you take us for idiots?

Ken: How do you know? Romans 5:18 “through one act of righteousness”

Adomnan: How do I know Paul doesn't teach something he never mentions? I dunno. Common sense, I guess. So, now you're saying that Christ's righteousness was "one act of righteousness"? You just defined it differently from every other "Calvinist" who ever existed.

Ken: Others too numerous to keep typing out.

Adomnan: Oh, yes. Of course. All of those verses that talk about how Christ's righteousness is imputed to people are way too numerous to type out. They're in the small print. Just trust Ken and sign on the dotted line.

Ken, speaking as Paul: Read my words in Romans 3:28 and other places. It is “by faith” vs. “not by works” see also Romans 9:30-32. “alone” is supplied by “apart from works”. Galatians 2:16

Adomnan: Paul would no doubt ask you to stop interjecting your words into what are supposed to be quotes from him.

So, if I write "Obamacare will cost a lot in taxes, apart from how much it will increase insurance premiums," then that means "Obamacare will only cost a lot in taxes." Whatever.

By the way, Paul's "works" refer only to "works of the Law," a phrase that means "specifically Jewish observances like circumcision." It does not mean "good works" or "human efforts" or "works in general" or any such thing. But don't bother thinking about this. I realize you're too intellectually challenged to understand this point, which I've already discussed at length with Nick anyway. You'll just get a headache.

Why don't you counter-reply for Webster, then, if you think I haven't refuted him (since he never has), and explain why you think so. And don't skip over every argument you find difficult.

I just may do that someday; if I ever had that much time. Thanks for the challenge. I remember reading your articles on that several years ago; but I confess I have not looked at them in a long long time.

I am answering on these things with Adomnan because I have some time and I am answering off the top of my head that doesn't require any deep research.

In any event, I can see you're getting fed up with this, and so I'll end my "monologue" with Ken now.

Not fed up with it; I was just curious what you thought would be accomplished (specifically with Ken). I agree with you that it can always be potentially helpful for others reading (though it works better with them minus all the personal remarks).

That was the only reason I ever dialogued with anti-Catholics. If it were my choice in a purely personal situation, I would never waste my time. It was only the pedagogical purpose that motivated me.

Well, that's a big part of the problem. What Adomnan is saying cannot be answered sufficiently in that way. Perhaps that is why he (correctly) maintains that you don't really engage in dialogue.

But I will say that you answering off the top of your head and preaching to us is more than William Webster has ever done.

Nor did James White ever truly defend his positions when I critiqued them (back when I still tried to do so in vain with him). He might reply once with mockery and half-answers and more mockery and insults, but that was it.

Adomnan: Maybe so, but Ken can be so obtuse that I can't keep up the pretense that I take him seriously. It's like trying to have a discussion with a four-year-old, except he's an adult with quite a bit of life experience.

And I am genuinely offended when he blithely ascribes senseless and unrighteous behavior to God. Sometimes I can't hide that.

I was wondering if anyone has considered the meaning of 2 Corinthians 5:21 in the context of this discussion?

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

The whole of chapter 5, of course, gives a much fuller context regarding the idea of penal substitution--that is, what does it mean that Christ died for all (vv. 14,15)? If there is no penal substitution, what does His death (and resurrection) mean to us? In what way would it have any effect on us if not substitutionary?

Oh, I meant to add one thing. In typical Protestant parlance, a fundamentalist is (historically) a conservative Evangelical Protestant Christian who is most likely Arminian in his theology, and who embraces a kind of legalistic mindset--that is, "don't drink, don't smoke, don't dance," etc.

Reformed Christians are also conservative Evangelical Protestants, but they believe in the "liberty of conscience," that is, the Scriptures alone have the power to bind the conscience of the believer. Therefore, they find (as one example) drunkenness to be sin, but not drinking per se. They are also more likely to be "Calvinistic" in their theology.

Typically, Reformed (Calvinists) would not consider themselves to be "fundamentalists."

but Ken can be so obtuse that I can't keep up the pretense that I take him seriously. It's like trying to have a discussion with a four-year-old,

Well, this illustrates my point. If you don't take him seriously at all, then it can't possibly be a serious discussion; it's simply toying, and IMHO that doesn't even work for purely pedagogical purposes. It has to at least be a serious discussion, wouldn't you agree?

I agree pretty much with your characterization, but there are also things like YEC that are traditionally the domain of fundamentalism. If Sproul accepts that, then we can clearly see an overlap. Anti-Catholicism is also a frequent identifier.

Therefore, they find (as one example) drunkenness to be sin, but not drinking per se. They are also more likely to be "Calvinistic" in their theology.

On a somewhat related note: why, then, do Presbyterians use grape juice for Holy Communion, whereas the Bible refers to wine?

Adomnan: Certainly a serious discussion would be much better (if a lot more work!). I'd say my discussion with Ken was somewhat serious, on my side at least, in the sense that I made serious arguments against his positions, even if I didn't hold him in high regard as an interlocutor.

Moreover, as you noted, it can be useful for some readers for us Catholics to engage common "Protestant Fundamentalist" arguments, which are often crudely and unthinkingly advanced. We have to deal with them in the form they are presented to us.

Pilgrimsarbour, I understand your misgivings about my use of the term "Fundamentalist." The problem I have is that I need a term that covers people with views like those of Ken, Sproul, James White and others.

These people are active on the Internet. They challenge Catholics and support each other. We hear from them frequently. Sometimes I have to refer to them as a group, and I can't call them simply "Reformed," because that word covers many liberal churches, especially in Europe. I can't call them "Conservative Reformed," because I reserve that term for Neo-0rthodox Reformed thinkers like Karl Barth. Besides, they are too fringy to be labeled "Conservative," in my opinion.

So what would be a good term to cover people who believe both in penal substitution and YEC? Any suggestions? If not, I have to stick to "Protestant Fundamentalists" or maybe "Calvinist Fundamentalists," faute de mieux.

Ken: I was wondering if anyone has considered the meaning of 2 Corinthians 5:21 in the context of this discussion?

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Adomnan: For what it's worth, I discussed this passage in my exchange with Ken.

First of all, I am persuaded that the best translation of the word "hamartia" ("sin" in "made him to be sin") is actually "sin offering." Hamartia frequently means "sin offering" in the Septuagint. This understanding of hamartia is reflected in a number of translations, including the New International Version, which renders "peri hamartias" in Rom 8:3 as "to be a sin offering.": "God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering." The New Jerusalem Bible renders "hamartia" in 2 Cor 5:21 as "offering for sin."

People often confuse the OT "sin offering" with the scapegoat. However, the sin offering was free from all blemish and sin ("him who knew no sin") and was offered to God. On the other hand, sin was transferred to the scapegoat, which was not offered to God. Since Paul says Jesus was a "sin offering," he is saying that He wasn't a scapegoat. Jesus is never compared to the scapegoat in the NT, not even in the discussion of the Day of Atonement in Hebrews.

Therefore, the statement "He made him who knew no sin to be a sin offering" contradicts the penal substitution theory.

I also explained "in him we become the righteousness of God" in the discussion above. The "we" refers to Paul and his co-missionaries in spreading the gospel, just as it does in the surrounding passage. The righteousness of God is God's saving righteousness; i.e., His faithfulness to His promise to save. It is a characteric of God, not of us Christians.

However, I don't want to get too involved in a discussion of the second part of 2 Cor 5:21. To refute any implication of penal substitution in the verse, it is enough to focus on the first half.

On a somewhat related note: why, then, do Presbyterians use grape juice for Holy Communion, whereas the Bible refers to wine?

That's a good question, and there a couple of ways to answer it.

Technically speaking, Jesus refers to "the fruit of the vine" in the context of the Lord's Supper, rather than "wine," as he does in other contexts. (See, for example, what He says about old wine in new wineskins, the fact that John the Baptist would not drink wine or strong drink, the wine mixed with myrrh, etc.) In this sense, grapejuice is as much "fruit of the vine" as is (fermented) wine, so most don't see it as a conflict with the Scriptures.

There is, of course, another reason not to use wine:

It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. Romans 14:21

In the early years of the 20th century, Reformed and Fundamentalist folks joined forces to combat the modernism that was taking over the mainline Protestant denominations, particularly in this case the Presbyterian Church USA. Both groups were called "Fundamentalist" without distinction then, but today most Reformed people would not refer to themselves as Fundamentalist.

You probably know the story of the Independent Board for Foreign Missions, Princeton Seminary and the Fundamentalist/Modernist controversy. When the OPC was formed, one of the earliest issues to resolve was what kind of denomination it would be--Fundamentalist or Reformed. Reformed thought won the day then.

The thinking for Fundamentalists has been that the state of the culture and the amount of alcohol abuse demanded abstinence for the Christian. The Reformed folks did not agree, seeing this as binding the conscience of the believer to some mandate other than the Scriptures.

However, they were also mindful of Romans 14:21. Today individual congregations are free to use either wine or grapejuice according to their specific needs without conflicting with the Scriptures.

I don't use "fundamentalist" with your precision, but rather as it's used in common parlance nowadays, as when the media refer to "fundamentalist Islam." Most "Reformed" denominations and people are now liberal (Swiss Reformed, Dutch Reformed, German Reformed, French Reformed). And all of these churches, plus the liberal Presbyterians, Congregationalists, etc, can be called "Calvinist" in some sense, as of course can the followers of Karl Barth and, well, even Schleiermacher.

I generally use "fundamentalist" myself only for extreme positions within Protestantism, such as YEC, anti-Catholicism, KJV-Only, and overtly anti-intellectual, anti-cultural, know-nothing sorts of groups or belief-systems, as well as hyper-legalism over drinking, dancing, rock music, etc.

Reformed Christians generally qualify in this criteria by virtue of anti-Catholicism; sometimes YEC. Even Sproul, whom I have liked in many ways (used to hear him on the radio every day when I did delivery work) is an anti-Catholic and now YEC as well. So is Steve Hays. Calvinists rarely qualify as a result of legalism or anti-intellectualism or an anti-cultural stance. I would say this is where they often excel (Francis Schaeffer et al: a huge influence in my own Christian life).

As for grape juice, isn't the historical reason the temperance movement of the late 19th, early 20th century? That is my understanding of it. Once it changed, then there was probably an urge to justify it on theological or spiritual grounds, as you have done, since caving into cultural movements without always stellar biblical backing is not exactly the best rationale in changing a time-honored Christian rite (which had already been ravaged by [largely] Protestant disbelief in the Real Presence).

OTOH YEC could easily qualify as anti-intellectual, and anti-Catholicism is severely illogical and viciously circular. So even a guy like Sproul who is thought of as a scholarly sort, oddly places himself in league with anti-intellectualism by adopting these goofy positions.

Presbyterian Marion Lovett backs up my opinion as to why Presbyterians changed to grape juice, in the paper, "Why Did We Change the Grape Juice to Wine in the Communion Cup?"

http://www.christreformedchurch.org/PDF/WineinCommunion.pdf

"The substitution of grape juice for wine had its origins not in the Bible, but in influences of American culture with the demands of the temperance movement in the mid-nineteenth century . . .

"The change of wine in the communion cup to grape juice came about as a result of two dynamics that were working in the Church in America. First of all, as already noted, was the wrong view that alcohol is, itself, sinful. This was the precursor of audaciously changing the wine in communion to grape juice in violation of the clear institution of Christ. . . .

"The second dynamic which resulted in the change of the element was a low view of the sacrament of communion. The doctrinal strength of the Church was waning and the sacraments were seen mostly as memorial “ordinances.” When theChurch has a low view of the sacraments, then it is easy to be flippant with changing things around. . . .

"All of the great reformed confessions of the 16th Century call for the administering of wine in communion (Belgic Confession; The Heidelburg Catechism; 2nd Helvic Confession). The Westminster Confession of Faith prescribes the use of wine (29,6). The modern Presbyterian Church of America (PCA) manual of Church order designates the partaking of bread and wine. The London Baptist Confession of 1689 calls for the use of wine (30:5). Even the Southern Baptist Abstract ofPrinciples of 1859 decrees that bread and wine is to be used in the Lord’s Supper. The Baptist Faith and Message written in 1925, long after the temperance movement, and long after Welch developed pasteurization for grape juice in 1868, called for bread and wine. The Church always believed the element in thecommunion cup was real fermented wine and never anything less."

"When the proponents of abstinence and those who wished to change theelement from wine to juice came along in the 19th century, some well-versed men of the Church strongly opposed the move. Theologians, such as Presbyterian A.A. Hodge and Baptist John Dragg were some of the first to be confronted with the question and were adamant in their refusal to change the elements of the Lord’sSupper to pacify the legalistic spirit of the age. . . .

"It was wrong to change it, and since I had grown up in the culture of the Church that practiced abstinence, taught that alcohol was sin, and used grape juice in communion, I simply went along with tradition without questioning the practice. Not until I began studying the meaning of the sacraments did I see the serious flaw and the need to reform the practice according to what Christ intended."

"Some of you, without the cultural baggage of the early and middle years of the Twentieth Century may well wonder why it is that we use Welch’s grape juice for our communion services when all of the appropriate biblical texts do indeed specifically read “wine”. The really interesting thing about the discussion of “The Fruit of the Vine” before us today is that it applies only to Americans in the specific historical context of the last 150 years.

"Author Keith A Mathison, (whose recent book Given for You is being used as an outline of issues regarding the subject of communion for this series) makes the following accusation: 'The historical origin of the modern American evangelical practice of substituting grape juice for wine can be traced directly to the nineteenth-century temperance movement.'

"Perhaps I have been unkind in using the word accusation? You will have to read the rest of his chapter to sense that he is impatient at having to discuss this topic at all. In fact, there is a growing consensus within Reformed circles that the use of non-alcoholic grape juices for communion is at the very least: 'quaint' or 'eccentric.'"

George Marsden, himself a Calvinist (I believe), in his well-known work, Fundamentalism and American Culture (Oxford Univ. Press, 1980) -- which I read in 1988, two years before my conversion), did not exclude Reformed Christians from the categories of fundamentalism or evangelicalism at all. He writes, for example:

"Baptists, Methodists, Free Church movements, Lutherans, and Reformed all had fundamentalist offshoots . . . Other denominations, including the Missouri Synod Lutheran and the Christian Reformed, were also Americanized to an extent by adopting some fundamentalist ideals while retaining other distinctive features of their European traditions."

(pp. 194-195)

He even places Calvinism right at the heart of fundamentalism:

". . . fundamentalism arose primarily among groups with Reformed origins, such as Baptists and Presbyterians, and was quite rare on the Methodist side of American revivalism, which emphasized the ethical rather than the intellectual aspects of Christianity."

Pilgrimsarbour: If there is no penal substitution, what does His death (and resurrection) mean to us? In what way would it have any effect on us if not substitutionary?

Adomnan: I didn't offer a response to this, but will now. Christ's death and resurrection is a victory over sin and death, on our behalf. It is the story (the "true myth," if you will) that we identify with when we die and rise with Christ in baptism. It is also the story of another sacrament, the Eucharist, which is why Christ's death is a sacrifice. The Eucharist is a partaking of the sacrificial body and blood of Christ. Every ritual is based on a story, which it reenacts.

So the reason for Christ's death is to supply us with these two great sacraments, I would say. Christ's sacrifice has no effect on the Father. God "set forth" the sacrifice to benefit us. The Father does not benefit from it, is not changed by it, doesn't satisfy any wrath, or receive any payment to forgive sins. As Romans 3:25 puts it: "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation (note: I'd prefer "expiation") through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God."

The only reason for the Passion of Christ is the sacraments, to give us the sacraments that flow from His Passion. No death; no baptism and no eucharist. And so He died for us.

In my view, it would be truer to say that the sacraments were the cause of the Passion than that the Passion was the cause of the sacraments, but both are true.

It doesn't much matter to me how people use the term fundamentalist, except as it pertains to me. I will continue to correct folks if I think it is necessary for the sake of clarity. Those of us in the OPC, perhaps, have a very specific use for the term which is tied to particular events in our history. I haven't talked to my Westminster friends about it, but now I'm curious and plan to do so.

I don't classify you as one. In fact, I use the term "fundamentalist" very little in my apologetics (and even objected to Karl Keating's wide use of it before I converted. I wrote him a long letter). I use "anti-Catholic" a lot precisely because it describes one's stance towards the Catholic Church, that I defend as an apologist, and because it is an accepted description, used widely in academia.

Adomnan wrote:"The Father does not benefit from it, is not changed by it, doesn't satisfy any wrath, or receive any payment to forgive sins."

I would agree that God is not changed by it, in an ontological sense, but it depends of what you mean by "changed by it". God does not change. Malachi 3:6

However, the forgiveness of sins is only possible through blood atonement/sacrifice and death is a punishment of God - Ezekiel - 18:4; 18:20 "the soul that sins, it shall die." Genesis 2:7 "in the day you eat of it, you shall surely die." Romans 6:23 - "the wages of sin is death"

But don't you agree that God has real anger and wrath against sin ? John 3:36; 3:18 (condemnation, judgment); Romans 1:18; Romans 5:9.

"Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him." Romans 5:9

What does Romans 5:9 mean, if the cross (bloody death) was not an effective atonement that propitiated God, or satisfied His justice against sin?

Anselm even wrote about this satisfaction of justice.

So, why did God Himself require the shedding of blood for the forgiveness of sins? (Hebrews 9:22 (all of chapters 7-10 explain this in detail); Leviticus chapters 4-5; 16-17)

Even though I was answering off the top of my head, (I know Scripture pretty well; I don't mean to brag; but that is one way one can participate in fast discussions on these type of blogs.)

I was taking all that I and you wrote seriously (except for the insults and ad hominem) and I provided lots of Scripture, without having to type all of it all out (but I do type out key passages and key concepts); so, I don't understand calling it a monologue and I don't understand you continuing to call me "obtuse" and "a four year old". (ad homimen attacks and insults)

This doctrine does not ascribe any evil to God. God is a Holy Trinity from all eternity, and in the counsel of the Trinity, the Father and the Son agreed together in perfect unity and executed perfect justice and perfect love by becoming flesh and being offered up as a sin offering. I agree that 2 Cor. 5:21 means "sin offering" - offering for sin - this comes from the Leviticus 4-5 background - but how ? The sin was transferred from us to Christ by imputation. Isaiah 53:10-12

Here again, as in many other verses I supplied, we see the condemnation of sin by God was paid for by Christ being condemned in the flesh, because He became flesh, in the likeness of sinful flesh, but without sin Himself. The just for the unjust, He died for our sins, He was executed as a substitute for us and took our place in judgment/justice and love.

Romans 3:24-26 "that He might be the just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus"

Also, there are plenty of passages which speak of "the Lord smelled the soothing aroma" of the smoke of the offering - and His wrath/anger against sin was appeased; so that concept also points to the substitutionary atonement and satisfaction of the wrath of God as the proper meaning of "propitiation"

Isaiah 53:10 - "the LORD was pleased to crush Him, if He would render Himself a guilt offering"

As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; by His knowledge the Righteous one, My servant, will justify the many, and He will bear their iniquities. . . He bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors."

I told Dave that I wouldn't get involved in further exchanges with you, Ken; and I feel I should stick to what I said.

It's fairly pointless to debate you anyway, because you don't pay attention to anything I write. That's why Dave characterized our exchanges as "monologues," and why I said you were obtuse and like a four-year-old in argument. Mere assertion and bald contradiction don't make for a discussion. You'd have to interact with the points I made, not just ignore them or simply deny them.

However, if some third party believes you have made good arguments in favor of penal substitution and tells me which they are (even by simply copying them from you), then I might respond.

I do feel I have paid attention to what Adomnan has said and I have tried to answer his points and questions with Scripture, exegesis, and reasoning. Sometimes I came back days later, but I did eventually answer everything.

There may be some fine point that he feels was not answered, ok, show me; maybe I missed something.

He doesn't accept my approach, I understand that; but the answers are there.

First of all, I am persuaded that the best translation of the word "hamartia" ("sin" in "made him to be sin") is actually "sin offering." Hamartia frequently means "sin offering" in the Septuagint.

Yes, especially in the sacrificial contexts. The reason it was translated that way is because the Hebrew word for sin and guilt were also used for “sin offering” and “guilt offering”. (without the word, “offering”. The background of hamatia (sin) being used also as “sin offering” is in Leviticus chapters 4-5. (Leviticus 4:3-4; 15; 24; 29: 33;- sin and sin offering, see below)

5:1; 5:5-6; 5:15;5:17-19 - same parallel - both sin and sin offering and guilt and guilt offering are the same word, with the preposition "L" meaning "for" or "unto" - the animal became sin by imputation, by taking the place of us who deserved punishment.)

God calls the offering just “sin” ( Khata חָטָא or Khatat חַטָּאת, with לְ, meaning “for”), many times the word for “offering” is just not there. He calls the offering “sin”. What does He mean? He means that the human sin has been transferred (imputed) to the animal and then the animal is killed because the sin was “on the offering”, dying in place of the guilty human. The laying the hands on the animal was more than dedicating it to the LORD; it certainly included that; as Leviticus 16:21-22 shows. We discussed this before, and I realize that that it only here where the writer of Leviticus spells it out about the confession of sins over the animal. It is not a stretch to understand all the “laying the hands on the head of the animals of Leviticus 1-7 as confession of sins and symbolic of transferring the human sin to the animal. Why? Because in the NT, it says that Christ “bore” our sin and ‘carried away” our sin. John 1:29 - “takes away the sin of the world” – Christ was the lamb that God would provide in Genesis 22:7-8, but God supplied a ram. Christ was the fulfillment of the passover lambs in Exodus 12:1-13; and Christ is the fulfillment of the peace offerings, burnt offerings, sin offerings, and guilt offerings of Leviticus 1, 3, 4, and 5. And Christ is also the fulfillment of the sacrifices on the day of atonement in Leviticus 16-17. More on that below.

I think I am interacting with Adomnan is claiming, and answering on point.

Adomnan wrote:People often confuse the OT "sin offering" with the scapegoat. However, the sin offering was free from all blemish and sin ("him who knew no sin") and was offered to God. On the other hand, sin was transferred to the scapegoat, which was not offered to God. Since Paul says Jesus was a "sin offering," he is saying that He wasn't a scapegoat. Jesus is never compared to the scapegoat in the NT, not even in the discussion of the Day of Atonement in Hebrews.

Yes, Jesus was both, because of the “sending away” (Lev. 16:21) and Christ “bearing our iniquities”. “Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” John 1:29 That phrase “takes away” points to the background of Lev. 16:21 of “sending it away”. I John 3:5 “And you know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him is no sin.” The “taking away” of sin points to the scapegoat who “took the sins away”. The bearing of sin in Lev. 16:22 is fulfilled by Christ bearing our sin in His body on the tree. ( I Peter 2:24 and Isaiah 53:4-12)

So 2 Corinthians 5:21 points to a double imputation, that our sin was imputed onto Christ, on the cross; and He willingly out of love bore the penalty and punishment for our sins; and His righteousness was imputed to us by faith in Him and His death on the cross. We were justified by faith alone, apart from works (Romans 3:28; Gal. 2:16), and by grace (Titus 3:7, and by His blood (Romans 5:9).

This shows that justification by faith and imputation of our sins to Christ on the cross and His righteousness being imputed to us is at the heart of the gospel and the heart of the difference between the Reformation and the Roman Catholic Church.

So, Adomnan is completely wrong to say we "earn our salvation" - Philippians 2:12 does not mean that in context. Because God is "in us", in believers, we are to put forth effort and work it out, what God is first working in us.

So, the title of your article is wrong; and the verses you have do not teach that men "helps to save themselves", rather good works are the evidences, fruits, results of true faith and grace inside of us.

The paratheses (Which is Always Enabled by God's Grace) is true from the Reformed view also - so the grace that enables us causes us to work out our salvation, not work for it. We participate in that we really do the believing and willing and choosing and working it out in love and obedience, but only because God first changed our hearts and opened our hearts (Lydia - the Lord opened her heart so that she responded to the things Paul was preaching. Acts 16:14) God was the one who was doing the initial willing and working for His good pleasure. ( Philippians 2:13)

God first makes us alive by grace ( Ephesians 2:4-5) after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation" ( Ephesians 1:13); then we believe and then, good works show and demonstrate that we are a believer. Before that we were dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1-3) and enslaved to sin ( John 8:34), unable to obey God (Romans 8:2-8).

I know you all know this, but for the sake of other readers at various knowledge levels, I'll chime in here.

The difference between the two communions, as I see it, is this:

Catholicism sees justification as an ongoing process (synergistic) which does not cease even after the death of the individual (purgatory).

Protestantism sees justification as a one-time declaration by God which does not involve our work to attain it (monergistic).

The Protestant would call the entire process, including justification, salvation, the component parts being:

1) justification2) sanctification3) glorification (consummation)

The Catholic, from what I can tell, refers to the whole process of what we call salvation as justification, that is, a "making just," which is hardly distinguishable from their understanding of sanctification.

However, Protestantism does see sanctification as synergistic once the heart has been made anew in and by Christ, without our "help." Once resurrected the formerly dead sinner's will is drawn to Christ and enabled by His Holy Spirit to grow in grace, which does, in fact, require our cooperation to produce the best results.

So there are synergistic elements in Protestant theology, but just not in that initial step of justification.

"Catholicism does see initial justification as monergistic and sanctification as synergistic once the heart has been made anew in and by Christ, without our "help." Once resurrected the formerly dead sinner's will is drawn to Christ and enabled by His Holy Spirit to grow in grace, which does, in fact, require our cooperation to produce the best results."

Not a whole lot of difference, is there?, when put this way. Yet Ken (thankfully, not you) would place us in a position of having a false, non-salvific gospel and a theology not even fit to be called Christian.

"Catholicism does see initial justification [baptism; in adults there must be faith in Christ and all the de fide dogmas of the RCC and submission to the Pope, etc. God gets it started, but the final decision to beleive is with the person, they can reject; that is, the heart is not drawn and changed all the way; in infant baptism, no faith] as monergistic

[really? can you show that documented by Roman Catholic documents? My understanding was that in RCC theology, while God starts the process of giving grace and helps the person see a little, the final decision is left to the individual to believe or not to believe; whereas in Reformed monergism, the heart is drawn all the way so that the faith is a willing choice of irresistible acceptance of Christ - the person is so changed and overwhelmed that he/she cannot not trust Christ. that is not what RC teaches.] and sanctification as synergistic once the heart has been made anew in and by Christ, without our "help."

Another problem is that you immediately can loose your initial justification by mortal sin; and that happens almost immediately, and so no one can keep their justification, because it is a process of loosing it and gaining and keeping it by good works. (praying to Mary, going to confession, giving to the poor, taking the Eucharist) Whereas in Protestantism, you are justified by faith alone in Christ at the point of faith, "having been justified by faith, we have peace with God" (Romans 5:1). In your system, you have no real peace or assurance.

Not getting into it, Ken. It never goes anywhere. You are a prisoner of "either/or" false dichotomies and false premises and thus cannot comprehend Catholic teaching, which is based on biblical / Hebraic paradox and both/and thinking.

For you, that equates to "synergy" which in turn is Pelagian and a false gospel of supposed works-salvation. It's all been explained to you over and over but you don't get it.

This is essentially a word-for-word copy of my latest post on my blog, but I don't know if anyone will see it, so here it is!

One of the things I drew from this discussion is an impression I get from some of the things Adomnan said regarding OT sacrificial typology. Unless I'm mistaken, it seems to me he is advocating a one-to-one correlation between the types and their fulfillment in Christ. That is, the lamb means one thing, the goat something else, the priesthood something else, etc. So we get the idea that the scapegoat was sent away into the wilderness, that it wasn't offered to the Father, thus nullifying penal substitutionary atonement.

Since Christ is the single fulfillment of all the OT types in His person, He is the embodiment of all of them taken together as a whole picture. He fufills the OT office of prophet, the Levitical office of priest, the governmental role of the OT Judges as King, the sacrificial lamb on the altar, and the scapegoat. If not, there is no need for the Jews to have done any of these things in preparation for His coming--they have no meaning apart from their eventual fulfillment in Him. They are all about Him, and as such must be seen as a whole picture.

Regarding further the typology of the scapegoat, we see in Psalm 103:12:as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us."which must be considered in light of this:

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all Isaiah 53:6.

The Christ offering was sinless, but He voluntarily took upon Himself the sins of His people--it was His mission to bring peace to the earth. (I have briefly discussed this in a reprint blog article at my site here).

All this is to say that the perfect active obedience of Christ earned Him the right to offer Himself on the cross as the supreme sacrifice for the sins of His people. His perfect passive obedience in voluntarily giving up His life to His Father is what removes our iniquity, our enmity with God because of our sin. The OT types in their entirety, taken as a whole picture, demonstrate the atoning, propitiatory and expiatory act of Christ on the cross.

I wasn't aware that there is anything monergistic in Catholicism. As far as I knew, everything the Catholic believer does must be in cooperation with the Father, including justification.

If I have been wrong about this, please direct me to something in the catechism which will help me to understand what you're saying. My edition is the Doubleday/Image publication 1995, although I just purchased it new last year.

A non-Pelagian position on grace is necessarily monergistic at the outset. The person with grace then has the power to cooperate with grace by working together with God, including for salvation (as I recently wrote about). Everything is caused by this grace; without it we could do no good thing. Catholics and Protestants agree on that. It is only the cooperation aspect and how we classify stuff where there is disagreement.

I have made a handy chart of Trent's teaching on Justification, with summaries:

CANON I.-If any one saith, that man may be justified before God by his own works, whether done through the teaching of human nature, or that of the law, without the grace of God through Jesus Christ; let him be anathema.

CANON II.-If any one saith, that the grace of God, through Jesus Christ, is given only for this, that man may be able more easily to live justly, and to merit eternal life, as if, by free will without grace, he were able to do both, though hardly indeed and with difficulty; let him be anathema.

Man can do absolutely nothing to obtain initial justification; therefore, at this point it is monergistic:

CANON III.-If any one saith, that without the prevenient inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and without his help, man can believe, hope, love, or be penitent as he ought, so as that the grace of Justification may be bestowed upon him; let him be anathema.

[see also Decree on Justification: chapter 5]

Man's free will to do any good is "moved and excited by God": at which time man can then cooperate, in this grace:

CANON IV.-If any one saith, that man's free will moved and excited by God, by assenting to God exciting and calling, nowise co-operates towards disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of Justification; that it cannot refuse its consent, if it would, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive; let him be anathema.

CANON X.-If any one saith, that men are just without the justice of Christ, whereby He merited for us to be justified; or that it is by that justice itself that they are formally just; let him be anathema.

Good works and merit proceed wholly from the grace of God through the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf (not from ourselves). They are necessary but they do not earn salvation, whichis by grace alone: Decree on Justification: chapter 16; Canons 18, 19, 20, 24, 26, 32, 33.

"Wherefore faith itself, even when it does not work by charity [Gal 5:6], is in itself a gift of God, and the act of faith is a work pertaining to salvation, by which man yields voluntary obedience to God Himself, by assenting to and cooperating with His grace, which he is able to resist (can. v)."

Not really, we didn't get into this much (from what I can remember). We got into it a little as related to faith alone vs. works, (and here with Adomnan, but that is mostly about what he likes to criticize, ie, penal substitution); but not specifically monergism vs. synergism in justification. Most of our debates and my participation over the years was about Mary and Sola Scriptura, the papacy, doctrine of development type stuff, and some regarding Sola Fide,(and some on the Beatles (LOL); but not much specifically about monergism and synergism.

CANON X.-If any one saith, that men are just without the justice of Christ, whereby He merited for us to be justified;

I understand this part.

Adomnan seemed to disagree with the Council of Trent here- I think; he said there is no "righteousness of Christ", only "God's righteousness", which I guess Adomnan means "the Father". He was not too clear.

or that it is by that justice itself that they are formally just; let him be anathema.

What does it mean here? Could you flesh this one out? Seems to contradict the first part.

Good works and merit proceed wholly from the grace of God through the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf (not from ourselves). They are necessary but they do not earn salvation,

Adomnan said "we earn our salvation" and that Philippians 2:12 means "work for" and "earn". Jimmy Akin (and you) said on the Bible Answer Man Program with James White that the RCC does not teach we "earn" our salvation. How does the magisterium make it clear and walk into the room with a living voice with this contradiction between you guys?

As many others have said, the issue of the Reformation was not the necessity of grace, but the sufficiency of grace (to take us all the way from justification to glorification); as those verses from John 6 and Romans 8 clearly teach.

1987 The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us "the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ" and through Baptism: . . .

[since most Catholics are baptized as infants, insofar as the infant is concerned, this justification and regeneration is completely monergistic: an action of God alone. One could say others are standing in for the child -- I believe that Reformed would agree -- , but that is scarcely different from a Protestant praying that someone would be "saved / justified" -- God uses human beings somewhere in the process]

1989 The first work of the grace of the Holy Spirit is conversion, effecting justification in accordance with Jesus' proclamation at the beginning of the Gospel: "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, thus accepting forgiveness and righteousness from on high. . . .

[Grace comes first, causing conversion. Man is "moved by grace." At that point it is monergistic]

1992 Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy and pleasing to God, and whose blood has become the instrument of atonement for the sins of all men. Justification is conferred in Baptism, the sacrament of faith. . . .

1996 Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life.

1998 This vocation to eternal life is supernatural. It depends entirely on God's gratuitous initiative, for he alone can reveal and give himself. It surpasses the power of human intellect and will, as that of every other creature.

[again, monergistic in its initial stage . . .]

1999 The grace of Christ is the gratuitous gift that God makes to us of his own life, infused by the Holy Spirit into our soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it. . . .

2001 The preparation of man for the reception of grace is already a work of grace. This latter is needed to arouse and sustain our collaboration in justification through faith, and in sanctification through charity. God brings to completion in us what he has begun, . . .

2008 The merit of man before God in the Christian life arises from the fact that God has freely chosen to associate man with the work of his grace. The fatherly action of God is first on his own initiative, and then follows man's free acting through his collaboration, so that the merit of good works is to be attributed in the first place to the grace of God, then to the faithful. Man's merit, moreover, itself is due to God, for his good actions proceed in Christ, from the predispositions and assistance given by the Holy Spirit.

2009 Filial adoption, in making us partakers by grace in the divine nature, can bestow true merit on us as a result of God's gratuitous justice. . . .

2011The charity of Christ is the source in us of all our merits before God. Grace, by uniting us to Christ in active love, ensures the supernatural quality of our acts and consequently their merit before God and before men. The saints have always had a lively awareness that their merits were pure grace. . . .

2017 The grace of the Holy Spirit confers upon us the righteousness of God. Uniting us by faith and Baptism to the Passion and Resurrection of Christ, the Spirit makes us sharers in his life.

2020 Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ. It is granted us through Baptism. It conforms us to the righteousness of God, who justifies us. It has for its goal the glory of God and of Christ, and the gift of eternal life. It is the most excellent work of God's mercy.

2022 The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. Grace responds to the deepest yearnings of human freedom, calls freedom to cooperate with it, and perfects freedom.

2023 Sanctifying grace is the gratuitous gift of his life that God makes to us; it is infused by the Holy Spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it.

2027 No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. . . .

1266 The Most Holy Trinity gives the baptized sanctifying grace, the grace of justification:- enabling them to believe in God, to hope in him, and to love him through the theological virtues; . . .

I'll suspend my (loose) resolution not to interact with Ken to counter a misrepresentation:

Ken: CANON X.-If any one saith, that men are just without the justice of Christ, whereby He merited for us to be justified;

I understand this part.

Adomnan seemed to disagree with the Council of Trent here- I think; he said there is no "righteousness of Christ", only "God's righteousness", which I guess Adomnan means "the Father". He was not too clear.

Adomnan: I didn't say there was no righteousness of Christ. I said that Paul never mentioned the righteousness of Christ. Neither does any other NT writer, EXCEPT for 2 Peter, who writes:

"1Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:"

The Council of Trent probably had this passage from 2 Peter in mind in Canon X.

Since the righteousness of Jesus Christ here is coupled with "the righteousness of God," it means the same thing as the "righteousness of God;" i.e., it is Christ's faithfulness to God's promise to redeem the Gentiles. It is Christ's "act of righteousness," as Paul put it in Romans 5. God the Father manifested His righteousness through the righteous act of Christ, which merited our justification. This is not a characteristic or personal quality of Christ that can be abstracted from Him and transferred or imputed to other people.

And, yes, when Paul writes of the "righteousness of God," he means the righteousness of the Father, or, if you prefer, of YHWH (i.e., God's faithfulness to His promises; His "saving righteousness").

That is how God (i.e., the Father) can be "just (righteous) and the justifier" of those who believe in Christ. He shows He is just by being faithful to His promise to redeem (justify) the Gentiles through the progeny of Abraham (Jesus Christ).

Adomnan: It's not just "Adomnan" who says this. Paul says this. The verb in Phil 2:12 means "earn," as I have demonstrated through citing Greek lexicons and usage.

If Jimmy Akin and Dave deny that we "earn" salvation, then they are evidently using "earn" with a different nuance than I or Paul uses it. There are some uses of "earn salvation" that would be false; e.g., if someone were to say that we can earn or merit salvation apart from God's grace.

If Jimmy Akin and Dave deny that we "earn" salvation, then they are evidently using "earn" with a different nuance than I or Paul uses it.

No; we all agree.

There are some uses of "earn salvation" that would be false; e.g., if someone were to say that we can earn or merit salvation apart from God's grace.

Yep. It's false if by it we mean Pelagianism or works-salvation. It is true in terms of cooperative merit. God gives us the grace to participate and work together with Him. Merit is God crowning His own gifts, as Augustine says. He wants us to participate in the thing, but it is all by grace and never without it.

Entirely biblical . . . Ken can't grasp it because, like I said, he is in bondage to either/or unbiblical thinking and inability to grasp biblical paradox. Protestantism (but especially Calvinism) is shot-through with this annoying deficiency.

I get very tired of it. I tired of it long ago, because it was so clear to me what caused the problems in discussing this whole area: false and unbiblical either/or assumptions, and inability to accept biblical paradox and synergy.

Explicit Biblical Evidence of Men Helping to Save Themselves or Participating in Their Own Salvation (Which is Always Enabled by God's Grace)

I explain my position on this in many places. It's standard Catholic orthodoxy.

Either/or thinking can't comprehend this. If man does anything, in this mentality, God does nothing, and it is works-salvation. It's all or nothing. God must do all. The problem is that the Bible says many times that we do do stuff, in and under God's grace. It doesn't dichotomize men's actions and God's grace, as men do, following the traditions of men.

The Bible supports Catholic positions again and again, and systematically.

6) He doesn't simply drop a million Scripture references and basically ignore what was said by us.

Obviously "a million" is an exaggeration; but you dropped a big string of Catechism references - 18 in a row in 2 posts, one after the other. (right before you made this comment) Now, I don't object to that - you are seeking to marshal your evidence. How come you are able to do that; and I cannot present my case from Scripture with less references?

Doesn't seem fair in your rules of dialogue.

I don't ignore everything forever; sometimes I need to time to think about some things and do some research; what's wrong with that? sometimes it takes me a while to get to some points. As far as I can tell, I have been dealing with all yours and Adomnan's points so far.

Adomnan: I didn't say there was no righteousness of Christ. I said that Paul never mentioned the righteousness of Christ. Neither does any other NT writer, EXCEPT for 2 Peter, . . .

"The righteousness of Christ" does not have to be forced by you to appear in that word order in order for the concept to be Scriptural. Obviously, Christ was righteous, right? He was sinless and He always obeyed His Father and always did what was pleasing to Him, right? When He got baptized, He said to John the Baptizer, in Matthew 3:15 "Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness."

Romans 5:19--For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.

Obviously, His obedience on the cross was a righteous action, because He was righteous, holy, pure.

His whole life was righteous - I have come to do the will of Him who sent Me. "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me." John 4

so, "the righteousness of Christ" is the whole character of Christ's righteousness, culminating in the obedience of Him on the cross, that is imputed to us in an exchange - which we get as a gift by faith in Christ - 2 Cor. 5:21 "that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

It is a theological deduction from these verses, without having to be forced into the demand for the exact phrase, "righteousness of Christ imputed to us".

Here's another one that points to Christ's righteousness being imputed to us, because we are "in Him" ( count how many time "in Him" is used in Ephesians chapter 1.

I Cor. 1:30But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption,

Baptism is the outward symbol (at least, you must admit) of being identified with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. Romans 6:1-7)

“I was speaking in Santa Barbara, California once, and the professor of Eastern religions, who was an American gentleman, came to argue with me. He asked me if I would speak the next night on why I am not a Hindu. I declined, saying if you throw mud at others, not only do your hands get dirty, but you also lose a lot of ground.

But he said, "I dare you to do it, and I'll bring my whole class in philosophy at the end of your talk, to tear you to shreds." I said, "that's not a very welcoming thought.

But let me do this: I will speak on why I am a Christian, and implicit in that is why I am not a Hindu. And you can bring your philosophy class to talk to me." Which he did.

I proposed the fact that Hinduism is loaded with contradictions. I won't go into those details. But at the end of which, he came up to the front and just about wanted to hit me. He said, "Mr. Zacharias, the reason you portrayed Hinduism the way you did, is because you don't understand the Eastern mind."

[LOL ! Ravi is Indian and this guy was a western born American!]

I couldn't believe it, but I decided to be nice. . . .

He said, "Ravi, there are two kinds of logic," (actually, he's wrong: there are more.) "One is the either/or logic. If you make a statement that is true, the opposite of it is false. It is called the Law of Non-Contradiction. The same question at the same time, meaning the same thing, cannot elicit two opposite answers. If you ask my wife, 'are you expecting a child?' and at the same time if she says yes, and I say no, what will you say?"You'll probably say, that's the wrong question, they have a weird sense of humor, she's not his wife, or she hasn't talked to him. You wouldn't walk away saying 'thank you'." Why not? Because the same question at the same time, meaning the same thing, cannot elicit two opposite answers. That's the either/or logic - the Law of Non-Contradiction - you cannot contradict yourself."

Ken: It is a theological deduction from these verses, without having to be forced into the demand for the exact phrase, "righteousness of Christ imputed to us".

Adomnan: Why do you always force me to state the obvious? None of these verses singly, nor all of them together, posit a "righteousness of Christ" that is a sort of credit that can be transferred from one person to another.

So the Bible says Christ is righteous? So what? The Bible teaches that Paul is righteous; Job is righteous; any number of good people are righteous. Does it follow from that there is a "righteousness of Paul" that can be transferred from Paul to someone else, like money in an account?

And yet, because Jesus Christ is called righteous, you jump to the conclusion that there's a righteousness of Christ that can be "imputed to others." This is as much a non-sequitur, ON THE BASIS OF WHAT THE BIBLE ACTUALLY SAYS, as a righteousness of Job that can be imputed to others.

God the Father is called righteous, isn't He? So then there must be a "righteousness of God the Father" that can be imputed to others, by your logic.

Besides, to give just one example of a point I make that you simply IGNORE because you can't deal with it, the only thing that anyone in the NT says is "imputed" to anyone is FAITH. Well, then, are there TWO things that Paul teaches are "imputed to us," one he mentions (faith) and one he never mentions (Christ's righteousness)? Or are you claiming that our faith IS the alien righteousness of Christ?

But, of course, I won't get an answer to this question. I've asked it of you many times, and haven't gotten an answer yet. Why should I now?

"He said, "Ravi, that is Western." I said, "Scratch out that line." He said, "No, I won't." I said, "You're going to have to; you may as well scratch it out now."He said, "No, I won't."I said, "Keep going."He said, "The other kind of logic is Both/And. Not either this OR that: both this AND that. If you ask one Hindu if God is personal, and he says 'yes', and you ask another Hindu if God is personal, and he says 'no', you ask a third Hindu which of these is right, and he says 'both of them', he is very much in keeping with his way of looking at 'Both/And'. Both personal AND non-personal - that is the Eastern way of thinking."I said, "Scratch out that line."He said, "No, I won't." I said, "You're going to have to."He said, "No, I won't."I said, "Keep going."So finally he established: Either/Or Logic, the Law of Non-Contradiction, is Western. Both/And logic, the Law of Dialectic, is Eastern. Karl Marx used it: take the employer and the employee, put them together, you get the classless society. Nobody ever shows you one, but at in theory they talk about it. So there it is: Either/Or logic is Western, and Both/And logic is Eastern.I said, "Sir, have you finished?"He said, "Yes."I said, "What you are telling me is this: when I am studying Hinduism, I either use the Both/And system, or nothing else. Is that right?"Do you know what he said? He put his knife and fork down and he said, "The Either/Or does seem to emerge, doesn't it?"You see, he was using Either/Or logic to prove the Both/And logic. And the more he tried to clobber the Law of Non-Contradiction, the more it clobbered him. The psychologist said, "I think, John, this discussion is over; let's go back."

So, when Paul says many times, "we are justified by faith apart from works", it cannot be "both/and" (as your claim, and Adomnan, etc.), but indeed, it is either by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, or faith plus works.

That good works demonstrate and prove and result from true faith; that one has been converted and changed on the inside answers the verses that speak about works, like Ephesians 2:10 and James 2:14-26, for example. This also fits better with the law of non-contradiction.

To add works in as ground for justification, earning, or merit, are violations of the law of non-contradiction.

I don't ignore that point about faith being credited as righteouness because I don't have an answer; but because I haven't figured out how to say it yet.

I will answer more tomorrow; but for now, the Reformed understanding of that is that the faith is the instrumentality / agency by how we get righteousness, not the ground or basis of it. more tomorrow.

Ken: Romans 5:19--For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.

Adomnan: This verse proves that no righteousness is imputed to us while leaving us, in fact, sinners, as you heretics teach. If it were, then the clear implication would be that "the many" in the first part of the verse would not actually be sinners, but only that sin was "imputed" to what were in fact righteous folk. After all, Paul writes that as people are made sinners, EVEN SO (i.e., in the same way) they are made righteous. There is a perfect parallelism between the two halves of the verse.

Secondly, Adam's sin is not merely "imputed" to his descendants, but they are "made sinners." Just so, Christ's act of obedience -- NOTE: NOT HIS PERSONAL STATUS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS --is not "imputed to us." Rather, His "act of righteousness," as Paul calls it elsewhere, makes us righteous.

Now, watch Ken fail to engage with every point I have made about this verse. He will simply assert once again that "Christ's righteousness is imputed," maybe cite other, or even the very same, verses, which say NOTHING OF THE SORT.

Far from supporting the imputation of Christ's righteousness, this verse contradicts that error in the clearest and most certain way.

Ken: I Cor. 1:30But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption,

Adomnan: If this verse proved that Christ's righteousness were merely "imputed" to us, while we remained sinners, then of course it would also prove that Christ's holiness was merely imputed to us while we remained unholy and that Christ's redemption was imputed to us while we remained unredeemed. However, you heretics don't teach that sanctification and redemption are "imputed." So you can't use this verse to prove that Christ's righteousness is "imputed" either.

Besides, the verse doesn't say "Christ's righteousness" became righteousness to us. It says that Christ became righteousness to us, which is very different. Again, Paul shows no interest in "Christ's righteousness" as such.

. . . you dropped a big string of Catechism references - 18 in a row in 2 posts, one after the other. (right before you made this comment) Now, I don't object to that - you are seeking to marshal your evidence. How come you are able to do that; and I cannot present my case from Scripture with less references?

Doesn't seem fair in your rules of dialogue.

It ain't rocket science, Ken. I was fulfilling a request from pilgrim: who has a conversation and is courteous; therefore, I take my time to answer his sincere question:

please direct me to something in the catechism which will help me to understand what you're saying.

I did so. What to you is unfairness is to me a simple act of courtesy: one Christian to another. With you it ain't even one Christian to another, though, since you have placed me outside the camp . . .

Ken: I don't ignore that point about faith being credited as righteouness because I don't have an answer; but because I haven't figured out how to say it yet.

Adomnan: What's the difference between not knowing how to say something and not having an answer? If you had an answer, you'd know how to say it.

Ken: I will answer more tomorrow;

Adomnan: That will be a pretty piece of sophistry. Maybe Piper or Ravi Zacharias can help you out?

Ken: the Reformed understanding of that is that the faith is the instrumentality / agency by how we get righteousness, not the ground or basis of it.

Adomnan: Hm. So this will explain why Paul says that faith is IMPUTED as righteousness, and he never mentions Christ's righteousness? We will discover from you, no doubt, that Paul is really saying that faith is NOT imputed as righteousness, but something he never mentions is. This should be interesting.

Ken: more tomorrow.

Adomnan: Spare us. None of us wants to wade through another avalanche of hooey.

Adomnan: Hindus use the law of non-contradiction all the time, when it's called for, as do Buddhists, notwithstanding some anecdotal and self-serving conversation Zacharias may have had with an unidentified professor (of which only Zacharias's version is reported).

Ken: So, when Paul says many times, "we are justified by faith apart from works",

Adomnan: Paul says we are justified by faith apart from works of the Law. Paul's "works" are not "good works" or "human efforts" or anything that general. Rather they are specific Jewish observances like circumcision; things that Jews do as Jews, and that Gentiles don't do.

God's commandments (like "not coveting") are not "works of the Law." And obeying moral commands (as opposed to commands related to Jewish rituals/observances) are not works of the Law either. Paul calls the latter "dikaiomata," the "righteous requirements" of the Law, and clearly distinguishes them in Romans 2 from works of the Law. For one thing, Gentiles are required to follow the "righteous requirements," but not the "works."

So, Paul is simply saying that one is justified by faith (also called, "faith that works through love" and "the obedience of faith") apart from specifically Jewish observances. Or to put it even more simply: Paul is saying that Gentiles can be righteous through faith without becoming Jews.

He is not saying that people can be righteous apart from being good, as your position maintains.

Pilgrimsarbour: One of the things I drew from this discussion is an impression I get from some of the things Adomnan said regarding OT sacrificial typology. Unless I'm mistaken, it seems to me he is advocating a one-to-one correlation between the types and their fulfillment in Christ.

Adomnan: No. This is not an accurate description of my view. As I see it, there is an archetype or idea of sacrifice. Every actual, or "earthly," sacrifice, if it is to be called "sacrifice" at all, is an instance of that archetype. The Temple sacrifices of the Hebrews and the sacrifice of Christ both reflect the archetypal sacrifice, and Christ's sacrifice does so perfectly.

Christ's sacrifice can be called the "antitype," because of its perfection, and the earlier sacrifices the "types." However, they are not similar because the Hebrew sacrifices were intentionally done to "foreshadow" Christ's sacrifice. Nor was Christ's sacrifice intentionally modeled on the Hebrew sacrifices. Rather, their similarity derives from the fact that all were realizations of the idea or archetype of sacrifice.

To put it more simply, when the NT writers called Christ's passion and death a sacrifice, they had the archetype of sacrifice in mind, which they also saw actualized in the Hebrew sacrifices.

Or, more simply yet: If we want to know what the sacrifice of Christ means, we must look to the archetype and to its actualizations, particularly among the Hebrews.

Adomnan: Well, no. I'm interested in the archetype of sacrifice, but I don't get into the the "lambness" of Christ or the "goatness" of Christ or the "bullockness" of Christ, as if every detail of sacrificial ritual should be a Christological type or allegory.

Pilgrimsarbour: So we get the idea that the scapegoat was sent away into the wilderness, that it wasn't offered to the Father, thus nullifying penal substitutionary atonement.

Adomnan: I don't think that the scapegoat was a type of Christ at all. Certainly the NT writers never compared Christ to the scapegoat. The scapegoat episode was a detail of the Day of Atonement ritual, but it wasn't a sacrifice. Like the distribution of the meat of the victim among the priests and the disposition of the fat and other parts of the victim's body, it was a ritual detail with no application to Christ. Given that the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews compares Christ's sacrifice to the Day of Atonement ritual, he would certainly have mentioned the scapegoat episode if he thought it relevant. He didn't, and no other NT writers did either.

I'm just trying to be biblical about this, and there's no scapegoat typology signaled in the Bible.

Pilgrimsarbour: He fufills the OT office of prophet, the Levitical office of priest, the governmental role of the OT Judges as King, the sacrificial lamb on the altar, and the scapegoat.

Adomnan: The NT writers describe Christ as prophet, priest, king and sacrificial lamb. However, they do not compare Him to the scapegoat, even though they had occasion to do so (especially the occasion of the Epistle to the Hebrews' assimilation of the Day of Atonement ritual to Christ, while omitting the scapegoat episode.)

Pilgrimsarbour: If not, there is no need for the Jews to have done any of these things in preparation for His coming--they have no meaning apart from their eventual fulfillment in Him. They are all about Him, and as such must be seen as a whole picture.

Adomnan: I disagree. The Jews were performing sacrifices based on the archetype of sacrifice. They saw those sacrifices as "ex opere operato" effective, not as foreshadowings of some future sacrifice of the Messiah that they only dimly glimpsed. The suggestion that the Jews maintained the huge Temple cult and performed thousands of expensive sacrifices just as an extraordinarily elaborate dumb show symbolizing a future event is untenable. Certainly one modest annual sacrifice involving a single victim would have served this purpose quite adequately, if they had such a purpose.

We Christians see the sacrifice of Christ as the culmination and fulfillment of the Hebrew sacrifices, but only because it is the perfect expression of the archetype of sacrifice, of which all the earlier sacrifices were also actualizations.

Pilgrimsarbour: Regarding further the typology of the scapegoat, we see in Psalm 103:12:as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us."

Adomnan: There's no reference to the scapegoat here. "He" who removes our transgressions is seen here as the Father, not the Messiah, as the next verse suggests: "As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him;"

For even a tenuous connection to the "Messiah as scapegoat" conjecture, "he" would have to refer to the Messiah, not to the Father.

Pilgrimsarbour: which must be considered in light of this:

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all Isaiah 53:6.

Adomnan: Since Christ took on the burden of expiating our iniquity as a sin offering, it can certainly be said that "the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." In fact, Isaiah says as much in 53:10:

"Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand."

Isaiah himself explains that the Suffering Servant deals with our iniquity as an "offering for sin," not as a scapegoat. There is no allusion to the scapegoat in Isaiah 53. The mere statement that the Lord laid our iniquity on him does not suffice, because this statement can have a number of meanings. Since the Suffering Servant is an offering, he cannot be a scapegoat, because the scapegoat is precisely the goat (one of two) that is not offered.

Pilgrimsarbour: All this is to say that the perfect active obedience of Christ earned Him the right to offer Himself on the cross as the supreme sacrifice for the sins of His people.

Adomnan: Christ was God incarnate and didn't have to earn any rights.

Pilgrimsarbour: His perfect passive obedience

Adomnan: Christ was always actively obedient, never passively obedient. I know you're alluding to the active and passive obedience distinction that the Reformed like to make, but this distinction strikes me as otiose. I don't see such a distinction as biblical.

Pilgrimsarbour: in voluntarily giving up His life to His Father is what removes our iniquity, our enmity with God because of our sin.

Adomnan: I agree with this statement, as far as it goes. You don't say that the Father "punished" Christ or imputed others' sins to Him as if He were guilty or "poured His wrath on Him" or "satisffied His justice" by punishing Him or, in fact, anything indicative of penal substitution.

Pilgrimsarbour: The OT types in their entirety, taken as a whole picture, demonstrate the atoning, propitiatory and expiatory act of Christ on the cross.

Adomnan: However, the scapegoat is never alluded to in the Bible as a type of Christ.

Interestingly, the very early "Epistle of Barnabas," written in the first or early second century, does see the scapegoat in the Day of Atonement as an allegory of Christ. However, the application of the scapegoat figure to Christ is very different in this Epistle and in patristic thought to the scapegoat typology of the Reformers. "Barnabas" said that Christ was like the scapegoat not because he carried away sins, but because the Jews imputed sin to Christ even though he was sinless, just as they did to the scapegoat on the Day of Atonement. So, Barnabas saw the scapegoat as unjustly mistreated by the Jews, just as Christ was. (I don't agree with this allegory; I'm just reporting it.)

"works of the law" means all the requirements of the law, moral and ceremonial. You ignored much more of my statements than I have of yours, Adomnan.

Ephesians and Titus are written to Gentiles - he emphasizes that we are saved not by good works, and not by our own righteousness.

Ephesians 2:8-9;

Titus 3:3-5; Titus makes it clear - "He saved us not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness . . . " He is not talking to Jewish people, but to Gentiles on Crete ( 1:5) - so he is talking about the moral law.

I Clement also confirmed this - "not by holiness of heart"

"All these, therefore were highly honored and made great, not for their own sake, or for their works, or for the righteousness which they wrought, but through the operation of his will. And we too, being called by his will in Jesus Christ, are not justified by ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding, or godliness, or works which we have wrought in holiness of heart; but by that faith through which, from the beginning, Almighty God has justified all men." I Clement 32:3-4

Romans 9 also makes it clear, by "before they were born or did anything good or bad" - and you ignored that.

Romans 9:11, 14

for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God's purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls,

So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy."

"works of the Law" means all works of all the law, moral and ceremonial. God's law was one.

Paul uses the moral law to show its purpose to expose us as sinners in Romans 7 by referring to "do not covet".

Romans 7:5-13 and Gal. 2:19 also makes it clear that 'works of the law" does not mean only Jewish ceremonies and distinctives, like circumcision, it includes that for sure, but it includes all the law of God, the moral law included.

Gal. 2:19 "through the law I died to the law, that I might live to God. . .

"through trying to keep the law" (Torah = everything - "do not covet" - he discovered he could not keep that commandment and it produced even more coveting and sinning in his heart. " . . . I died to the law . . ." (realized I was a sinner and was driven to trust Christ. Gal. 3:24 - the role of the law as schoolmaster to lead us to Christ.

καὶ ἐλογίσθη αὐτῷ εἰς δικαιοσύνην. (and it was credited to him for (εἰς = “for” or “leading to”, or “into”, or “unto”, or “with a view to” - righteousness) Romans 4:3The words it was credited (ἐλογίσθη - elogisthe) translate only one verb in the Greek text. The verb is functioning as a divine passive, meaning that God was the one who did the crediting, not Abraham. Abraham did not earn righteousness by works, rather God credited righteousness to his account by faith. The Greek term elogisthe is used eleven times in 4:1-25 and may also be translated: “to impute,” “to reckon” or “to calculate.” “it” does not refer to “his faith”, as there is no “it” there in the text of Hebrew of Genesis 15:6 nor Romans 4 nor Galatians 3, rather “it was credited” means that God did the work of imputing righteousness to Abraham and all who believe. It is not like Romans 1:16-17, where “in it” ( ἐν αὐτῷ ) refers back to the gospel.Now the fact that elogisthe is used eleven times in 4:1-25 (nine in 4:1-12) suggests that the rest of this section is a developed commentary on the meaning and application of the term as understood from Genesis 15:6. Paul also cites Ps 32:1-2 (in 4:7-8) which is related to Genesis 15:6 verbally through the use of the same term, i.e., logisetai.

Romans 4:9 λέγομεν γάρ, ἐλογίσθη τῷ Ἀβραὰμ ἡ πίστις εἰς δικαιοσύνην., “for we say, it was credited to Abraham, the faith leading to righteousness”, does seem to say what you are claiming. This is one of the “new persepectives” on Paul. (N.T. Wright and others) This is certainly possible grammatically. But when we put it together with all the other passages that use the preposition ek (from, out from, by) or dia (through, by) or in the dative, “by faith”, it becomes clear that faith is the instrumentality/agency/occasion by which we are justified, not the ground or basis of our justification. It is faith in Christ as our object of trust/substitute and His work on the cross, His righteousness that is the ground or basis that is imputed to us. “Being justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God in Him. “ Romans 5:9 The wrath was taken out on the victim, the sacrifice, by killing it, shedding its blood. In Romans 4:9, “The faith” (ἡ πίστις ) is the subject, in the nominative, and it means the occasion of believing, having faith, rather than works, before he was circumcised, faith caused him to be justified by God, because Abraham believed in the LORD and in His promise to give him a son (seed – see also Galatians 3:16 ) – the Messiah who would be a blessing to all nations. The faith of Abraham is the means by which he was justified by God, not by doing works or being circumcised. As Piper says, “So when Paul says of Abraham, or of those who believe like Abraham, that their faith “is credited for righteousness” (Romans 4:3, 5, 9, 22, 23; Galatians 3:6), he does not mean that righteousness “consists of faith”. He simply means that their faith connects them to the promise of God’s imputed righteousness.” (Counted Righteous in Christ, p. 64, John Piper, Crossway Books, 2002) Piper also has a footnote on this to two sources – John Murray’s commentary on Romans and John Owen’s The Doctrine of Justification by Faith, vol. 5 of The Works of John Owen; he says that Owen gives 5 reasons and Murray 9 reasons why it does not mean faith is the basis or content of our righteousness, but faith is the agency or instrumentality or means by which God’s righteousness is credited to our account. I don’t have those works and I admit I would have to study all those points in order to further argue this issue in a deeper way. If I can find them on line or study this deeper later, I may try to make these points at some future time.This points to the fact that the object of our faith (Christ and His work on the cross) is more important and Christ Himself as the merit and content and objective basis for our justification, not just “our faith”, or “believe”. It is not just believing that we will get something/blessing/reward/escape from hell, etc., it is trusting in Christ and what He did on the cross.

The scapegoat of Leviticus 16:20-22 is fulfilled in Christ because of the phrases, "bear" in Isaiah 53 and I Peter 2:24 and "takes away" in John 1:29; I John 3:5. the "takes away" alludes to the scapegoat "taking it away".

The NT includes all of those types - the lambs sacrificed and the goats and sheep that were slaughtered and the scapegoat that is released, sent away.

As I mentioned, Christ fulfills the substitution in Genesis 22 -both lamb and ram; the Passover lamb of Exodus 12 and the sacrifices of Leviticus 1-7 and 16-17 - day of atonement and sacrifices before being able to enter into the holy of holies; the tabernacle/temple.

Ravi Zacharias' illustration still stands, it is a violation of the law of non-contradiction to say it is "both/and" with respect to "faith plus works" meriting and earning our salvation.

That is why all the passages that speak of works used by Roman Catholics (and other works righteousness systems - Mormons and JWs) to try to prove the title of your article are wrong; and can only properly be interpreted as the results, fruits, evidences of true faith and justification.

Ken: Romans 4:3The words it was credited (ἐλογίσθη - elogisthe) translate only one verb in the Greek text. The verb is functioning as a divine passive, meaning that God was the one who did the crediting, not Abraham.

Adomnan: Who ever said it was Abraham who did the crediting/imputing? This is a red herring, meant to confuse people.

And Romans 4:3 is no "divine passive." The verse reads: "What does the Scripture say? 'Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.'"

It's as clear as day that what was credited as righteousness was that "Abraham believed God;" that is, Abraham's faith.

Ken: “it” does not refer to “his faith”, as there is no “it”

Adomnan: Stupid remark. Most languages omit subject pronouns if the subject of the sentence is obvious. In this case, it is clear that what was credited was that "Abraham believed God:" that is, Abraham's faith.

The rest of this posting of yours, Ken, is meaningless maundering and doesn't merit a reply (even if I could decode it).

However, the really shameless sophistry occurs in your next post, to which I shall turn presently.

(Some who read this may think that I am being too harsh in my criticism of Ken's exegesis. However, you should bear in mind that I find Ken's sophistry to be immoral. I believe he is sinning against his own reasoning faculty and against the word of God when he distorts and falsifies what it says to further a theological agenda.)

Ken: Owen gives 5 reasons and Murray 9 reasons why it does not mean faith is the basis or content of our righteousness, but faith is the agency or instrumentality or means by which God’s righteousness is credited to our account.

I found Murray's 9 reasons on pp. 353- 359 of why it is "by faith" as the instrument/agency by which the work of Christ on the cross is imputed to us, not "faith itself" as the righteousness.

Adomnan: Just as I predicted.

Ken uses "Owens' 5 reasons" and "Murray 9 reasons (Wow! NINE!!)" to prove that when Paul says that faith is credited as righteousness (never mentioning Christ's righteousnes) what he really means is that faith is NOT credited as righteousness, but something Paul never mentions is! As Ken puts it, "the work of Christ on the cross is imputed to us, not 'faith itself' as the righteousness."

What would we do without Ken, Owens and Murray? Who else would explain to us that "faith is credited as righteousness" actually means "faith is NOT credited as righteousness"?

Ken: "works of the law" means all the requirements of the law, moral and ceremonial.

Adomnan: Wrong. "Works of the Law" refer solely to specifically Jewish observances. Circumcision is the only work of the Law that Paul cites explicitly. The phrase doesn't include moral commandments, which Paul calls the righteous requirement of the Law (dikaioma), not "works of the Law." Romans 2:

"26If those who are not circumcised keep the law's requirements, will they not be regarded as though they were circumcised? 27The one who is not circumcised physically and yet obeys the law will condemn you who, even though you have the written code and circumcision, are a lawbreaker.

"28A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. 29No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God."

Gentiles must do the "Law's requirements." They must not do "works of the Law."

Ken: Ephesians and Titus are written to Gentiles - he emphasizes that we are saved not by good works, and not by our own righteousness.

Adomnan: The question of whether Titus was a Jew or not is moot. However, it doesn't matter, because Paul says "we" and, in a personal letter to an individual like this, he clearly has himself in mind (among others) when he writes "we." Titus 3:3-5:

"3At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. 4But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, 5he saved us, not because of the works we did in righteousness, but because of his mercy."

"The works we did in righteousness" refer to specifically Jewish observances. Certainly, Paul didn't claim that Gentiles did "works in righteousness" before they were justified. However, Jews did do works "in the righteousness" of the Law, and so this phrase can only refer to Jews; and the righteousness Paul alludes to here can only be that same legal "righteousness" he speaks of in Phil 3:6: "as for legalistic righteousness, faultless."

Faith is an action that we do, trusting, believing, but it is still the gift of God, and the work of God ( John 6:29) - it is not meritorious.

Anyway, you are failing to interact with any of the other verses I mention. In doing theology, one must take all the verses relevant to the issue.

Adomnan:It's as clear as day that what was credited as righteousness was that "Abraham believed God;" that is, Abraham's faith.

No, but the act of trusting God and trusting in His promise to send one from his own body (Genesis 15:1-6) who would be the seed that would bless all the nations ( Gen. 12:1-3; 22:18; Galatians 3:16) was trusting in the future work of God, the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ, and His whole life of obedience and work of redemption and atonement on the cross; the act of trusting has no merit, but is the means/agency/instrumentality ( the consistent use of the dative in the NT) that transfers Christ's righteousness to us, the sinners.

Anyway, we have beat this issue a lot; I wish you peace and blessings and hope that you could see all this in the Scriptures.

Adomnan: So you claim that Ephesians doesn't mention Jews, that it's all about Gentiles?

Well, let's quote Ephesians and see what it actually says:

"8For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.One in Christ 11Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called 'uncircumcised' by those who call themselves 'the circumcision' (that done in the body by the hands of men)— 12remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. 14For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, 16and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility."

So we see that the whole purpose of Eph 2 was to assert that Jews and Gentiles have been made into "one body," that the "Law with its commandments and regulations" has been abolished. Well, the moral commandments haven't been abolished, have they? So what commandments and regulations have been, then? Answer: the "works of the Law," the regulations that mark off Jews from Gentiles. Obviously, these are the "works" that Jews "boast of" in Eph 9. Compare Romans 3:

"27Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.

28Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.

29Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also."

For Paul, it is Jews who boast. They boast of being under the Law, of doing the "works of the Law." So, in Eph 2:9, those who boast of "works" are also Jews, and Jews only.

Ken: No, but the act of trusting God and trusting in His promise to send one from his own body

Adomnan: No? No? Are you still saying that faith isn't imputed to Abraham as righteousness even though Paul says in so many words that it is? What is wrong with you? Do you have eyes and yet cannot see? Ears and yet cannot hear?

How can you baldly contradict the simplest and most straightforward statement of Paul? How can you "interpret" "faith is imputed as righteousness" to mean "faith is not imputed as righteousness"?

Ken: the means/agency/instrumentality ( the consistent use of the dative in the NT) that transfers Christ's righteousness to us, the sinners.

Adomnan: Ha! So it's "the dative." Oh, yes. That explains it: "the dative."

So Paul never mentions "Christ's righteousness" and yet he uses "the dative" to say it's "transferred to us." Got it.

Ken: Anyway, we have beat this issue a lot; I wish you peace and blessings and hope that you could see all this in the Scriptures.

Adomnan: Well, maybe once I read Murray's 999 reasons why Paul doesn't mean what he says and analyze "the dative" carefully enough, then it will all become clear to me. Nothing so absurd that enough words won't make it seem reasonable, as Calvinist theology proves.

"All these, therefore were highly honored and made great, not for their own sake, or for their works, or for the righteousness which they wrought, but through the operation of his will. And we too, being called by his will in Jesus Christ, are not justified by ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding, or godliness, or works which we have wrought in holiness of heart; but by that faith through which, from the beginning, Almighty God has justified all men." I Clement 32:3-4

Impiety is classically a lack of proper concern for the obligations owed to public religious observation or cult.

Adomnan: So the whole context of Clement's discussion is piety; that is, a concern for the obligations owed to public religious observation or cult. That is what he means by "works wrought in holiness of heart." The fact that Clement speaks of "holiness of heart" doesn't imply that he's not speaking of Jewish observances, which of course were supposed to be performed in holiness of heart.

And those who were "highly honored" were, of couse, Jewish figures from the OT. Clement is not speaking of Gentiles. So, once again, the whole context is Jewish piety.

Ken: Romans 9 also makes it clear, by "before they were born or did anything good or bad" - and you ignored that.

Adomnan: You posted this after I decided (obviously only temporarily) to stop dialoguing with you. That's the only reason I "ignored" it.

Ken: Romans 9:11, 14

for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God's purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls,

Adomnan: Paul's point is that, since the twins hadn't been born, they hadn't done anything at all, including of course "works of the Law." The fact that he writes "anything good or bad" does not imply that "works" mean "anything good or bad," which seems to be what you are suggesting. Obviously, the Judaizers thought the "works of the Law" (circumcision and other Jewish observances) were "good," and Paul was not disputing that. Paul was saying that, even if the "works" were good, they were not the basis for choosing who would bear the promise. Just so, the promise can devolve on the Gentiles even though they hadn't done Jewish "works."

Ken: The scapegoat of Leviticus 16:20-22 is fulfilled in Christ because of the phrases, "bear" in Isaiah 53 and I Peter 2:24 and "takes away" in John 1:29; I John 3:5. the "takes away" alludes to the scapegoat "taking it away".

Adomnan: Mere use of words like "bear" and "take away" don't suffice to establish a scapegoat analogy. Catholics call Christ, "agnus qui tollis peccata mundi ("lamb who take away the sins of the world"), but we don't believe in the Reformed scapegoat allegory.

Christ bears sins by suffering for sin, but not as a scapegoat. Besides, a scapegoat isn't really even punished, nor does it suffer. The point wasn't to punish the goat, but just to have it carry the sins into the wildnerness. Maybe the goat liked it in the wilderness. At least it wouldn't be dinner.

In any event, sin and guilt sacrifices took sins away, too. They removed them by cleansing them. The scapegoat wasn't a sacrifice. Isaiah 53 says that Christ took sins away as a guilt offering, not as a scapegoat.

By the way, your earlier point that sacrificial victims were treated as sinners because the word "chattat" or "lechattat" in Hebrew meant "sin" or "for sin" is not valid. The sin offering could be called "sin" or "for sin" in Hebrew as a sort of shorthand, but that doesn't imply anything beyond the fact that a shorthand designation was being used. So, the ascent sacrifice ("korban olah") could be called just "ascent." The evening sacrifice ("korban mincha) could be called "evening," etc. In any event, many Hebrew scholars believe that "chattat" is better translated as "purification" than as "sin;" e.g., Joseph Milgrom.

Finally, death is not always a punishment, as you insist. When a chicken is killed for dinner, is that a punishment? When a lion kills a gazelle, is it punishing the gazelle? Similarly, sacrificed animals were not thought of as "punished," even allegorically. If anything, it was considered a sort of privilege to be a sacrificial victim, because the animal life ("the life is in the blood") was being made sacred by being given to God.

You apparently see the Jewish Temple as a kind of law court, and all the sacrifices of animals there as judicial executions -- so that the holy altar was a sort of old-fashioned electric chair or gallows. You've got it all wrong. The sacrificial domain was completely separate from the judicial realm. Priests were not judges or executioners.

Abraham's faith was credited to him, in a sense, as opposed to works, leading to (eis = toward, unto, into, leading to, for) righteousness, not "as" righteousness, the faith was credited or imputed in the sense that it was the means/agency by which righteousness was attained as opposed to works.

We fully believe James is inspired, and we passionately teach against any kind of "easy believism" - to claim to have faith, but no fruit, means that it was an empty faith.

Since Genesis 15:1-6 comes before Genesis 22 - it is obvious in the context of James 2 that James means by justify, "to vindicate" or "to prove", "to demonstrate as real", which is the way Luke and Matthew use dikaisune in Luke 7:35 and Matthew 11:19

"wisdom is proved right by her deeds"

"wisdom is vindicated by her children"

and Paul in I Timothy 3:16 "vindicated by the Spirit"

This makes better sense, because James' emphasis is "you claim" or "you say", but "show me your faith by good works".

The demons believe that God is one and shudder. But their faith is not trust or love or embracing of God's ownership/Lordship/right to rule over them. Believing is trusting and loving and embracing and treasuring Christ, not just intellectual acknowledgment that He lived and died and rose from the dead in history.

James is fighting against people who claim to have faith, but there is no evidence in their lives of real faith.

The aspect of your title, "Which is always enabled by God's grace", would apply here. If we have received "grace upon grace" as John 1:16 says, that grace will enable believers to demonstrate it in their lives by good works and fruit and love, as Galatians 5:6 and Ephesians 2:10 and Galatians 5:22-23 says.

Adomnan and I had a fairly lengthy discussion regarding the issue of fiducia as an element of faith in the combox of one of Dave's previous posts--I forget where--Dave may be able to find it for us. At any rate, if I understand him correctly, the absence of the word "trust" (among other things) in the NT is indicative that it is not a true element of faith. Faith, he said, is "believing in what has been revealed." Of course, Protestants have issues with the RCC over what constitutes special revelation, but we didn't follow that up in our conversation. The NT talks about faith but not trust, although the OT speaks volumes on trusting in God.

As far as I can tell, Dave agreed with Adomnan that trusting in Christ is not taught in the NT and is not a requirement for salvation. I don't recall that Dave said this outright, but he didn't challenge Adomnan on the question and my request for other Catholics reading the combox to comment on the trust issue received no response. I gathered from that that official RCC policy is that faith does not require trust, although I recall perhaps quoting from the RCC Catechism that the word trust can be found there, but I think only once.

Dave can speak for himself, of course, if he wishes, but he was pretty much silent during that discussion I believe (and trust ). ;-)

Trust is an important element of faith, but faith cannot be reduced to it. It is the constant Protestant reductionism and either/or mentality that we object to. See:

The Catholic Encyclopedia: "Faith"

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05752c.htm

Excerpt:

"In the New Testament the meanings "to believe" and "belief", for pisteon and pistis, come to the fore; in Christ's speech, pistis frequently means "trust", but also "belief" (cf. Matthew 8:10). In Acts it is used objectively of the tenets of the Christians, but is often to be rendered "belief" (cf. 17:31; 20:21; 26:8). In Romans 14:23, it has the meaning of "conscience" — "all that is not of faith is sin" — but the Apostle repeatedly uses it in the sense of "belief" (cf. Romans 4 and Galatians 3)."

2756 Filial trust is put to the test when we feel that our prayer is not always heard. The Gospel invites us to ask ourselves about the conformity of our prayer to the desire of the Spirit.

2797 Simple and faithful trust, humble and joyous assurance are the proper dispositions for one who prays the Our Father.

2828 "Give us": The trust of children who look to their Father for everything is beautiful. "He makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." He gives to all the living "their food in due season." Jesus teaches us this petition, because it glorifies our Father by acknowledging how good he is, beyond all goodness.

397 Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command. This is what man's first sin consisted of. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness.

2738 The revelation of prayer in the economy of salvation teaches us that faith rests on God's action in history. Our filial trust is enkindled by his supreme act: the Passion and Resurrection of his Son. Christian prayer is cooperation with his providence, his plan of love for men.

2739 For St. Paul, this trust is bold, founded on the prayer of the Spirit in us and on the faithful love of the Father who has given us his only Son.31 Transformation of the praying heart is the first response to our petition.

322 Christ invites us to filial trust in the providence of our heavenly Father (cf. Mt 6:26-34), and St. Peter the apostle repeats: "Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you" (I Pt 5:7; cf. Ps 55:23).

1843 By hope we desire, and with steadfast trust await from God, eternal life and the graces to merit it.

176 Faith is a personal adherence of the whole man to God who reveals himself. It involves an assent of the intellect and will to the self-revelation God has made through his deeds and words.

177 "To believe" has thus a twofold reference: to the person, and to the truth: to the truth, by trust in the person who bears witness to it.

448 Very often in the Gospels people address Jesus as "Lord". This title testifies to the respect and trust of those who approach him for help and healing. . . .

1817 Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ's promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful." "The Holy Spirit . . . he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that we might be justified by his grace and become heirs in hope of eternal life."

227 It means trusting God in every circumstance, even in adversity. A prayer of St. Teresa of Jesus wonderfully expresses this trust: . . .

[under the section heading: "IV. THE IMPLICATIONS OF FAITH IN ONE GOD"]

2738 The revelation of prayer in the economy of salvation teaches us that faith rests on God's action in history. Our filial trust is enkindled by his supreme act: the Passion and Resurrection of his Son. Christian prayer is cooperation with his providence, his plan of love for men.

2837 "Daily" (epiousios) occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. Taken in a temporal sense, this word is a pedagogical repetition of "this day," to confirm us in trust "without reservation."

2778 This power of the Spirit who introduces us to the Lord's Prayer is expressed in the liturgies of East and of West by the beautiful, characteristically Christian expression: parrhesia, straightforward simplicity, filial trust, joyous assurance, humble boldness, the certainty of being loved.

451 Christian prayer is characterized by the title "Lord", whether in the invitation to prayer ("The Lord be with you"), its conclusion ("through Christ our Lord") or the exclamation full of trust and hope: Maran atha ("Our Lord, come!") or Marana tha ("Come, Lord!") - "Amen Come Lord Jesus!"

1062 In Hebrew, amen comes from the same root as the word "believe." This root expresses solidity, trustworthiness, faithfulness. And so we can understand why "Amen" may express both God's faithfulness towards us and our trust in him.

2830 . . . In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists on the filial trust that cooperates with our Father's providence. . . .

304 And so we see the Holy Spirit, the principal author of Sacred Scripture, often attributing actions to God without mentioning any secondary causes. This is not a "primitive mode of speech", but a profound way of recalling God's primacy and absolute Lordship over history and the world, and so of educating his people to trust in him. The prayer of the Psalms is the great school of this trust.

2547 The Lord grieves over the rich, because they find their consolation in the abundance of goods. "Let the proud seek and love earthly kingdoms, but blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven." Abandonment to the providence of the Father in heaven frees us from anxiety about tomorrow. Trust in God is a preparation for the blessedness of the poor. They shall see God.

215 "The sum of your word is truth; and every one of your righteous ordinances endures forever." "And now, O LORD God, you are God, and your words are true"; this is why God's promises always come true. God is Truth itself, whose words cannot deceive. This is why one can abandon oneself in full trust to the truth and faithfulness of his word in all things. . . .

1431 Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life, a return, a conversion to God with all our heart, an end of sin, a turning away from evil, with repugnance toward the evil actions we have committed. At the same time it entails the desire and resolution to change one's life, with hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. This conversion of heart is accompanied by a salutary pain and sadness which the Fathers called animi cruciatus (affliction of spirit) and compunctio cordis (repentance of heart).

2741 . . . If our prayer is resolutely united with that of Jesus, in trust and boldness as children, we obtain all that we ask in his name, even more than any particular thing: the Holy Spirit himself, who contains all gifts.

2119Tempting God consists in putting his goodness and almighty power to the test by word or deed. Thus Satan tried to induce Jesus to throw himself down from the Temple and, by this gesture, force God to act. Jesus opposed Satan with the word of God: "You shall not put the LORD your God to the test." The challenge contained in such tempting of God wounds the respect and trust we owe our Creator and Lord. It always harbors doubt about his love, his providence, and his power.

2579 . . . His prayer, the prayer of God's Anointed, is a faithful adherence to the divine promise and expresses a loving and joyful trust in God, the only King and Lord. . . .

2733 . . . The humble are not surprised by their distress; it leads them to trust more, to hold fast in constancy.

396 . . . The "tree of the knowledge of good and evil"symbolically evokes the insurmountable limits that man, being a creature, must freely recognize and respect with trust. Man is dependent on his Creator, and subject to the laws of creation and to the moral norms that govern the use of freedom.

2728 Finally, our battle has to confront what we experience as failure in prayer: discouragement during periods of dryness; sadness that, because we have "great possessions," we have not given all to the Lord; disappointment over not being heard according to our own will; wounded pride, stiffened by the indignity that is ours as sinners; our resistance to the idea that prayer is a free and unmerited gift; and so forth. The conclusion is always the same: what good does it do to pray? To overcome these obstacles, we must battle to gain humility, trust, and perseverance.

"I gathered from that that official RCC policy is that faith does not require trust, although I recall perhaps quoting from the RCC Catechism that the word trust can be found there, but I think only once."

Try the online Catechism with word search next time, my friend:

http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

Council of Trent:

Decree on Justification; CHAPTER XVI. On the fruit of Justification, that is, on the merit of good works, and on the nature of that merit.

. . . nevertheless God forbid that a Christian should either trust or glory in himself, and not in the Lord, whose bounty towards all [Page 44] men is so great, that He will have the things which are His own gifts be their merits.

Canons on Justification

CANON XXI.-If any one saith, that Christ Jesus was given of God to men, as a redeemer in whom to trust, and not also as a legislator whom to obey; let him be anathema.

[Note that this is not opposed to trust itself, but to the "either/or" exclusion of obedience alongside trust]

On the Most Holy Sacraments of Penance and Extreme Unction: On the Sacrament of Extreme Unction [Prologue]

For though our adversary seeks and seizes opportunities, all our life long, to be able in any way to devour our souls; yet is there no time wherein he strains more vehemently all the powers of his craft to ruin us utterly, and, if he can possibly, to make us fall even from trust in the mercy of God, than when he perceives the end of our life to be at hand.

THE BULL OF INDICTIONOF THE SACRED OECUMENICAL AND GENERAL COUNCIL OF TRENTUNDER THE SOVEREIGN PONTIFF, PAUL III:

But, seeing that it is written, commit thy way to the Lord, and trust in him, and he will do it, we have resolved rather to trust in the clemency and mercy of God, than to distrust our own weakness.

Expository Dictionary of NT Words makes itr very clear that pistis ("Faith") contains the elements of belief and trust, precisely as in Catholic teaching (the biblical "both/and"), whereas Protestantism (at least in some circles) greatly overemphasizes the trust element, so that it is out of balance (the over-rationalistic "either/or"):

"Faith" / pistis

primarily, "firm persuasion," a conviction based upon hearing (akin to peitho, "to persuade"), is used in the NT always of "faith in God or Christ, or things spiritual."

The main elements in "faith" in its relation to the invisible God, as distinct from "faith" in man, are especially brought out in the use of this noun and the corresponding verb, pisteuo; they are (1) a firm conviction, producing a full acknowledgement of God's revelation or truth, e.g., 2 Thess. 2:11,12; (2) a personal surrender to Him, John 1:12; (3) a conduct inspired by such surrender, 2 Cor. 5:7. Prominence is given to one or other of these elements according to the context. All this stands in contrast to belief in its purely natural exercise, which consists of an opinion held in good "faith" without necessary reference to its proof. The object of Abraham's "faith" was not God's promise (that was the occasion of its exercise); his "faith" rested on God Himself, Rom. 4:17,20,21. See ASSURANCE, BELIEF, FAITHFULNESS, FIDELITY.

Kittel's Theological Dictionary of the NT reiterates the same things, but going into extreme detail.

So, just as Protestants err if they reduce faith to mere "fiducial faith", it is also an error to cast all semblance of "trust" from the definition of faith, as Adomnan apparently did in past discussion:

"I would disagree with you strongly here. I don't think Christian faith is a matter of 'trust' at all. You won't find a lot of trust in the NT. You will, of course, find faith.

"Again, faith is nothing more or less than assent to what God reveals. In fact, I would go so far as to say that trust, as Protestants understand it, is inconsistent with true faith."

Psalm 91:2 will say to the LORD, "My refuge and my fortress; my God, in whom I trust."

Psalm 112:7 He is not afraid of evil tidings; his heart is firm, trusting in the LORD.

Psalm 115:9 O Israel, trust in the LORD! He is their help and their shield. (cf. 115:10-11)

Psalm 125:1 Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides for ever.

Psalm 143:8 Let me hear in the morning of thy steadfast love,for in thee I put my trust.Teach me the way I should go,for to thee I lift up my soul.

Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight.

Proverbs 16:20 He who gives heed to the word will prosper, and happy is he who trusts in the LORD.

Proverbs 22:19 That your trust may be in the LORD, . . .

Proverbs 28:25 A greedy man stirs up strife, but he who trusts in the LORD will be enriched.

Proverbs 29:25 The fear of man lays a snare, but he who trusts in the LORD is safe.

Isaiah 12:2 Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and will not be afraid; for the LORD GOD is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation."

Isaiah 25:9 It will be said on that day, "Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the LORD; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation."

Isaiah 26:3-4 Thou dost keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee, because he trusts in thee. [4] Trust in the LORD for ever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock. (cf. 30:15; 32:17; 42:17)

Isaiah 50:10 Who among you fears the LORD and obeys the voice of his servant, who walks in darkness and has no light, yet trusts in the name of the LORD and relies upon his God?

Jeremiah 17:7 Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD.

Jeremiah 39:18 For I will surely save you, and you shall not fall by the sword; but you shall have your life as a prize of war, because you have put your trust in me, says the LORD.

Daniel 3:28 Nebuchadnez'zar said, "Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed'nego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants, who trusted in him, and set at nought the king's command, and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God.

Daniel 6:23 . . . So Daniel was taken up out of the den, and no kind of hurt was found upon him, because he had trusted in his God.

Zephaniah 3:2 She listens to no voice, she accepts no correction. She does not trust in the LORD, she does not draw near to her God.

Romans 4:5 And to one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness.

Hebrews 2:13 . . . "I will put my trust in him." . . . . (cf. 1 Peter 2:23; note, however, that Jesus could not have "faith" in terms of belief in things not seen. He trusted His Father because they were one in the first place]

CANON XXI.-If any one saith, that Christ Jesus was given of God to men, as a redeemer in whom to trust, and not also as a legislator whom to obey; let him be anathema.

[Note that this is not opposed to trust itself, but to the "either/or" exclusion of obedience alongside trust]

Historic Protestants have always understood this; and understand "believe in the Lord Jesus Christ" as including repentance from sin and turning to Christ and trusting Him as Savior and Lord (your "legislator") - and Him being Lord means God and master and ruler and so justifying faith includes the willingness to obey Christ and surrender to Him as Lord.

So, in this case, we do not do the "either/or" mentality you accuse us of. Christ is both Savior and Lord. (Redeemer, God, and boss) Rather that is the modern "non-Lordship/easy believing/no repentance" kind of thing in many modern Evangelical churches. But it is wrong and unbiblical.

Thank you so much for your kind words. I didn't want you to think I felt obligated to return the favour, but the truth is that I appreciate your work in the combox, especially under some rather difficult circumstances.

Psalm 55:22 Cast your burden on the LORD, and he will sustain you; he will never permit the righteous to be moved.

2 Chron 14:11 And Asa cried to the LORD his God, "O LORD, there is none like thee to help, between the mighty and the weak. Help us, O LORD our God, for we rely on thee, and in thy name we have come against this multitude. O LORD, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee."

2 Chron 16:7 At that time Hana'ni the seer came to Asa king of Judah, and said to him, "Because you relied on the king of Syria, and did not rely on the LORD your God, the army of the king of Syria has escaped you.

Genesis 49:18 I wait for thy salvation, O LORD.

Psalm 27:14 Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the LORD!

Psalm 31:24 Be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the LORD!

Psalm 33:20 Our soul waits for the LORD; he is our help and shield.

Psalm 37:7 Be still before the LORD, and wait patiently for him; . . . (cf. 37:9; 37:34)

Psalm 38:15 But for thee, O LORD, do I wait; it is thou, O LORD my God, who wilt answer.

Psalm 39:7 And now, Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in thee.

Psalm 40:1 I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry.

Psalm 130:5-6 I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; [6] my soul waits for the LORD more than watchmen for the morning, . . .

Proverbs 20:22 . . . wait for the LORD, and he will help you.

Isaiah 8:17 I will wait for the LORD, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in him.

Isaiah 26:8 In the path of thy judgments, O LORD, we wait for thee; thy memorial name is the desire of our soul.

Isaiah 30:18 . . . blessed are all those who wait for him.

Isaiah 33:2 O LORD, be gracious to us; we wait for thee. Be our arm every morning, our salvation in the time of trouble.

Isaiah 40:31 but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

Isaiah 49:23 . . . those who wait for me shall not be put to shame.

Lamentations 3:25-26 The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him. [26] It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD.

Micah 7:7 But as for me, I will look to the LORD, I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me.

In the article is a link to Dave's combox where the original discussion took place. I'd like to say that I am battling Dave for the title of "Scattergun Approach to Most Scripture References in a Combox," but I think I am hopelessly outgunned.

And where were you when our friend Adomnan was beating me up in our discussion of faith and trust? That information would have been most helpful. :-)

I'm under no obligation whatever to participate in lengthy discussions here that begin wholly apart from me and often are even unrelated to the ostensible topic of the thread. This is especially the case in the Open Forum, where I usually participate very little or not at all.

I write about what interests me at any given time. I also try to respond to sincere questions. You asked about this, and it sparked my interest, so here I am doing a study on "trust" in Catholic teaching and in the Bible. That's why I am dealing with it now and didn't before.

But the endless debates that go on independently of what I am writing? Often, I don't even read them. Too time-consuming . . . only so many hours in a day.

My main concern (as I'm sure you can understand) is my own papers and dialogue about them.

The other discussions are fine, as long as it is understood that I reserve the right to comment on whatever I choose to, or to not do so, with regard to stuff extraneous from my own writing / research projects. I can't do everything.

Of course, now I am constructing a new comprehensive paper, not merely answering someone in dialogue, so the attempted comparisons to Ken's patented "massive text dump" methods of "dialogue" won't fly.

When I do stuff like this I'm comprehensive. The answer to pilgrim was in the Catechism texts. He found "trust" once in the CCC. I found about 70 instances . . . the rest then became my own project to document this aspect of Catholic faith, and no longer a dialogue.

1 Corinthians 1:7 so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ;

James 5:7 Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it until it receives the early and the late rain.

Jude 1:21 keep yourselves in the love of God; wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.

Psalm 106:24 Then they despised the pleasant land,having no faith in his promise.

[note: the phrase "faith in [God, Christ]" can imply "trust" or "belief" or both, or both, and other elements, such as obedience. But it doesn't exclude by any means the "belief" aspect of "faith"]

Mark 11:22 And Jesus answered them, "Have faith in God."

Acts 3:16 And his name, by faith in his name, has made this man strong whom you see and know; and the faith which is through Jesus has given the man this perfect health in the presence of you all.

Acts 20:21 testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance to God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Acts 24:24 . . . he sent for Paul and heard him speak upon faith in Christ Jesus.

Acts 26:18 ". . . that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me."

[Paul recalling what Jesus said to him at his conversion]

Acts 27:25 So take heart, men, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told.

Romans 3:22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. . . .

Romans 3:26 . . . he justifies him who has faith in Jesus. (cf. 4:16)

Galatians 2:16 yet who know that a man is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ, and not by works of the law, because by works of the law shall no one be justified.

Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Galatians 3:22 . . . what was promised to faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

Ephesians 1:15 I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints,

Ephesians 3:12 in whom we have boldness and confidence of access through our faith in him.

Philippians 3:9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, based on law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith;

Colossians 1:4 because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you have for all the saints,

Colossians 2:5 . . . the firmness of your faith in Christ.

Colossians 2:12 and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.

1 Thessalonians 1:8 . . . your faith in God . . .

2 Timothy 3:15 the sacred writings which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

Exodus 20:20 And Moses said to the people, "Do not fear; for God has come to prove you, and that the fear of him may be before your eyes, that you may not sin."

Numbers 14:19 . . . the LORD is with us; do not fear them."

Deuteronomy 1:21 Behold, the LORD your God has set the land before you; go up, take possession, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has told you; do not fear or be dismayed.

Deuteronomy 3:22 You shall not fear them; for it is the LORD your God who fights for you. (cf. 20:1, 3)

Deuteronomy 31:6 Be strong and of good courage, do not fear or be in dread of them: for it is the LORD your God who goes with you; he will not fail you or forsake you. (cf. Josh 8:1; 10:8, 25; 11:6)

Job 11:15 Surely then you will lift up your face without blemish; you will be secure, and will not fear.

Psalm 3:6 I am not afraid of ten thousands of people who have set themselves against me round about.

Psalm 27:3 Though a host encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident.

Ps 78:53 He led them in safety, so that they were not afraid; but the sea overwhelmed their enemies. (cf. 112:8)

Psalm 118:6 With the LORD on my side I do not fear. What can man do to me? (cf. Ps 46:2; 91:5; Is 54:14)

Matthew 10:28 And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (cf. Lk 12:4; Rev 2:10)

Deuteronomy 7:18 you shall not be afraid of them, but you shall remember what the LORD your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt,

2 Chronicles 32:7 Be strong and of good courage. Do not be afraid or dismayed before the king of Assyria and all the horde that is with him; for there is one greater with us than with him. (cf. 2 Ki 19:6; 25:24; Is 10:24; 37:6; Jer 42:11)

Nehemiah 4:14 And I looked, and arose, and said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, "Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes."

Isaiah 44:8 Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.

Jeremiah 1:8 Be not afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, says the LORD. (cf. 46:28; Ezek 2:6)

Hebrews 11:23 By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful; and they were not afraid of the king's edict.

Hebrews 11:27 By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king; for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.

Psalm 62:2, 6-7 He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be greatly moved. . . . [6] He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken. [7] On God rests my deliverance and my honor; my mighty rock, my refuge is God.

Psalm 94:22 But the LORD has become my stronghold, and my God the rock of my refuge.

Isaiah 17:10 For you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered the Rock of your refuge;

2 Samuel 22:31, 33 This God -- his way is perfect; the promise of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him. . . . [33] This God is my strong refuge, and has made my way safe. (cf. 22:3)

Psalm 2:12 . . . Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Psalm 5:11 But let all who take refuge in thee rejoice, let them ever sing for joy; and do thou defend them, that those who love thy name may exult in thee.

Psalm 18:30 This God -- his way is perfect; the promise of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.

Psalm 28:8 The LORD is the strength of his people, he is the saving refuge of his anointed.

Psalm 31:1-2, 4 In thee, O LORD, do I seek refuge; let me never be put to shame; in thy righteousness deliver me! [2] Incline thy ear to me, rescue me speedily! Be thou a rock of refuge for me, a strong fortress to save me! . . . [4] take me out of the net which is hidden for me, for thou art my refuge.

Psalm 37:39-40 The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD; he is their refuge in the time of trouble. [40] The LORD helps them and delivers them; he delivers them from the wicked, and saves them, because they take refuge in him.

Psalm 57:1 Be merciful to me, O God, be merciful to me, for in thee my soul takes refuge; in the shadow of thy wings I will take refuge, till the storms of destruction pass by.

Psalm 59:16 . . . For thou hast been to me a fortress and a refuge in the day of my distress.

Psalm 71:3 Be thou to me a rock of refuge, a strong fortress, to save me, for thou art my rock and my fortress.

Psalm 91:4, 9 he will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge;his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. . . . [9] Because you have made the LORD your refuge,the Most High your habitation,

Proverbs 30:5 Every word of God proves true; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.

Isaiah 25:4 For thou hast been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat; for the blast of the ruthless is like a storm against a wall,

Joel 3:16 But the LORD is . . . a stronghold to the people of Israel.

Nahum 1:7 The LORD is good,a stronghold in the day of trouble; . . .

Zechariah 9:12 Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.

Psalm 145:15 The eyes of all look to thee, and thou givest them their food in due season.

Isaiah 17:7 In that day men will regard their Maker, and their eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel;

Isaiah 31:1 Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the LORD!

Micah 7:7 But as for me, I will look to the LORD, I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me.

Deuteronomy 4:29 But from there you will seek the LORD your God, and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul.

1 Chronicles 16:10-11 Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice! [11] Seek the LORD and his strength, seek his presence continually!

1 Chronicles 28:9 the LORD searches all hearts, and understands every plan and thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off for ever.

2 Chronicles 7:14 if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

2 Chronicles 11:16 And those who had set their hearts to seek the LORD God of Israel came after them from all the tribes of Israel to Jerusalem to sacrifice to the LORD, the God of their fathers. (cf. 12:14; 14:4; 15:2, 12-13; 16:12; 19:3; 20:3-4; 26:5; 30:19; 34:3)

2 Chronicles 31:21 And every work that he undertook in the service of the house of God and in accordance with the law and the commandments, seeking his God, he did with all his heart, and prospered.

Ezra 8:22 . . . "The hand of our God is for good upon all that seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all that forsake him." (cf. Job 5:8; 8:5)

Psalm 14:2 The LORD looks down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there are any that act wisely, that seek after God. (cf. 9:10; 10:4; 22:26; 24:6; 27:8; 53:2; 69:6, 32; 77:2; 83:16; Rom 3:11)

Psalm 34:10 . . . those who seek the LORD lack no good thing.

Psalm 40:16 But may all who seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee; may those who love thy salvation say continually, "Great is the LORD!" (cf. 70:4; 105:3)

Psalm 63:1 O God, thou art my God, I seek thee, my soul thirsts for thee; my flesh faints for thee, as in a dry and weary land where no water is.

Psalm 105:4 Seek the LORD and his strength, seek his presence continually!

Psalm 119:2 Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart,

Isaiah 9:13 The people did not turn to him who smote them,nor seek the LORD of hosts. (cf. 11:10; 26:9; 51:1; 65:1)

Isaiah 55:6 Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near;

Jeremiah 29:13 Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; (cf. 50:4; Lam 3:25)

Daniel 9:3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes.

Hosea 3:5 Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the LORD their God, and David their king; and they shall come in fear to the LORD and to his goodness in the latter days. (cf. 5:6, 15; 7:10; 10:12; Amos 5:4, 6; 8:12; Zeph 1:6; 3:12; Zech 8:21-22; Mal 3:1)

Matthew 7:7-8 "Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. [8] For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. (cf. Lk 11:9-10; Jn 5:44)

Acts 15:17 that the rest of men may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name,

Acts 17:27 that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel after him and find him. Yet he is not far from each one of us,

Hebrews 11:6 . . . For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

Now I'd like to highlight Bible passages that bring out the aspects of assent, intellectual or doctrinal belief, obedience and works as aspects of faith and following God: the "other side of the coin," so to speak (besides the trust and hope aspects):

John 3:36 He who believes in the Son has eternal life; he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him.

John 6:29 Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."

Acts 5:32 . . . the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him

Romans 1:5 through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations,

Romans 1:8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world.

Romans 10:3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness.

Romans 10:16-17 But they have not all obeyed the gospel; for Isaiah says, "Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?" [17] So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes by the preaching of Christ.

Romans 15:18 For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has wrought through me to win obedience from the Gentiles, by word and deed,

Romans 16:19 For while your obedience is known to all, so that I rejoice over you,

Romans 16:26 but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith --

2 Corinthians 9:13 Under the test of this service, you will glorify God by your obedience in acknowledging the gospel of Christ, and by the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others;

Galatians 5:6-7 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is of any avail, but faith working through love. [7] You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth?

1 Thessalonians 1:3 . . . your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Thessalonians 1:8 For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedo'nia and Acha'ia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything.

2 Thessalonians 1:8, 11 inflicting vengeance upon those who do not know God and upon those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. . . . [11] To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his call, and may fulfil every good resolve and work of faith by his power,

Hebrews 5:9 and being made perfect he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him,

James 2:18, 22 Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith. . . . [22] You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by works, . . . [24] You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.

1 Peter 4:17-18 For the time has come for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God? [18] And "If the righteous man is scarcely saved, where will the impious and sinner appear?"

Belief in the Christian (or earlier Jewish) Message; Acceptance of the Gospel, Etc.

Genesis 15:6 And he believed the LORD; and he reckoned it to him as righteousness. (cf. Ex 4:1, 5, 8-9, 31; Rom 4:3, 11, 17-18; Gal 3:6; Jas 2:23)

Exodus 14:31 And Israel saw the great work which the LORD did against the Egyptians, and the people feared the LORD; and they believed in the LORD and in his servant Moses.

Numbers 14:11 And the LORD said to Moses, "How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs which I have wrought among them? (cf. 20:12; Deut 1:32; 9:23; 2 Ki 17:14; Ps 78:32)

2 Chronicles 20:20 And they rose early in the morning and went out into the wilderness of Teko'a; and as they went out, Jehosh'aphat stood and said, "Hear me, Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem! Believe in the LORD your God, and you will be established; believe his prophets, and you will succeed."

Isaiah 43:10 "You are my witnesses," says the LORD,"and my servant whom I have chosen,that you may know and believe meand understand that I am He.Before me no god was formed,nor shall there be any after me. (cf. 28:16)

Isaiah 53:1 Who has believed what we have heard? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

Jonah 3:5 And the people of Nin'eveh believed God . . .

Mark 1:15 and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel."

Mark 5:36 But ignoring what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe."

Mark 9:42 Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung round his neck and he were thrown into the sea.

Luke 22:67 "If you are the Christ, tell us." But he said to them, "If I tell you, you will not believe;

Luke 24:25 And he said to them, "O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!

John 2:11 This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

John 3:12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

John 8:24 . . . you will die in your sins unless you believe that I am he.

John 8:31-32 Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him, "If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples,[32] and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free."

John 8:42-43 Jesus said to them, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I proceeded and came forth from God; I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. [43] Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word.

John 14:11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me; or else believe me for the sake of the works themselves.

John 16:27 for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from the Father.

John 20:31 but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name.

Acts 6:3, 5 Therefore, brethren, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may appoint to this duty. . . . [5] . . . they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit,

Acts 20:21 testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance to God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 3:27 Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On the principle of works? No, but on the principle of faith.

Romans 4:24 . . . It will be reckoned to us who believe in him that raised from the dead Jesus our Lord,

Romans 6:8-9 But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. [9] For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.

Romans 9:33 as it is written, "Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone that will make men stumble, a rock that will make them fall; and he who believes in him will not be put to shame."

Romans 10:9-11 because, if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. [10] For man believes with his heart and so is justified, and he confesses with his lips and so is saved. [11] The scripture says, "No one who believes in him will be put to shame." (cf. 10:14, 16; 1 Cor 1:21; 3:5; 15:2; 2 Cor 4:13; Gal 2:16; Gal 3:22; Eph 1:13, 19; Phil 1:29)

Romans 12:3 For by the grace given to me I bid every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith which God has assigned him.

Romans 13:11 Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed;

Romans 14:1-2 As for the man who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not for disputes over opinions. [2] One believes he may eat anything, while the weak man eats only vegetables.

1 Corinthians 2:5 that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. (cf. 2:7)

1 Corinthians 15:11-12 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.[12] Now if Christ is preached as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?

2 Corinthians 10:14-15 For we are not overextending ourselves, as though we did not reach you; we were the first to come all the way to you with the gospel of Christ. [15] We do not boast beyond limit, in other men's labors; but our hope is that as your faith increases, our field among you may be greatly enlarged,

Ephesians 4:5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism,

Philippians 2:11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

1 Thessalonians 4:14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. (cf. 2 Thess 1:10; 2:12)

2 Thessalonians 2:13 But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God chose you from the beginning to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.

1 Timothy 1:4 the divine training that is in faith (cf. 1:16; 3:16)

1 Timothy 2:7 For this I was appointed a preacher and apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. (cf. 4:3, 10; 2 Tim 1:12)

2 Timothy 3:14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it

Titus 1:4 To Titus, my true child in a common faith: . . .

James 2:19 You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe -- and shudder.

1 Peter 1:8 Without having seen him you love him; though you do not now see him you believe in him and rejoice with unutterable and exalted joy. (cf. 2:6-7)

2 Peter 1:1 Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours in the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ:

1 John 3:23 And this is his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us.

1 John 5:4-5 For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith. [5] Who is it that overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? (cf. 5:1, 10, 13)

For humans, especially, yes it was. Romans 5:12; and Genesis 2:17 and Romans 6:23 certainly seem to be saying that.

When a chicken is killed for dinner, is that a punishment? When a lion kills a gazelle, is it punishing the gazelle?

Before the fall, before sin, it seems that everyone was vegetarians - Genesis 1:29

Genesis 9:1-4 - after the flood, God says he gives meat to eat (presumably, they were also eating meat after the fall up until the flood also; as hinted at by the killing of animals for skins in Genesis 3:21) just as He gave plants to eat in Genesis 1:29 for food.

Their was death in plants and microbes, obviously, but it seems to be saying that death entered into the world by sin; and so it is a punishment/judgment/curse for sin.

Whether animals died before the fall is a different issue. The implication is that the first shedding of blood is there in Genesis 3:21

Adomnan: So the Hebrew priests were merely executioners and the holy altar of God was a gallows, a place of execution? And "sacrifice," even though it means "making sacred/holy," actually is just another word for execution?

Actually, the Bible doesn't present death as a punishment from God, but rather as a consequence of sin. So, Paul writes that death is "the wages of sin;" that is, something that sin "pays out," not God -- unless you think that not only Jesus Christ, but the Father, is "sin." Death is not the "wages," or punishment, of God.

Romans 5:12: "Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned."

So you see, Paul doesn't blame death on God (as if He inflicted it as punishmnet), but on sin.

Finally, God warned Adam and Eve that they'd die as a consequence of sinning. He didn't impose death on them.

I might add, by the way, that I don't take the Adam and Eve/Garden of Eden story as "historical" in our modern sense. I see it as a description of the human condition in images and symbols. So your speculations about whether animals died or not before the first human sin strike me as inane and superstitious. The geologic record shows that animals have been dying for billions of years. (And, no, I don't want to get into a debate about Biblical literalism/fundamentalism and young earth creationism. So please don't start.)

I believe that the first human couple fell from a higher state of being by forgetting their union with God and so entering into a condition of dualism/division, which is only possible in separation from God. In fact, sin is simply separation from God. As Genesis puts it, Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They fell into a state where their "flesh" was not completely governed by spirit (as opposed to our future, "spiritual" -- as Paul calls them -- resurrection bodies). I hasten to add that this is not a Gnostic contempt for "matter" as such, but a recognition of the problematic status of the material aspect of human existence, what Paul calls "the flesh," when it is not governed by spirit. The Incarnation redeems matter and the flesh by spiritualizing it.

I don't want to get into an argument over young earth vs. old earth either . . .

But Adam and Eve, it seems to me are real historical people, the first created humans directly by God - to not believe that is serious danger - it means you don't take the genealogies seriously at all, and Genesis and Chronicles treat them as real time and space history.

Paul takes them as real history in I Timothy 2:11-16 on why women cannot be elders/pastors/teachers with authority over men. How do you deal with that?

Plus,I Samuel 2:6 - "The LORD kills and makes alive, He brings down to Sheol and raises up."

see also Deuteronomy 32:39 and 2 Kings 5:7

You don't seem to believe in God's sovereignty and that it was God's decree of punishment for sin - "In the day you eat of it you shall surely die" - Genesis 2:17.

Whatever you call it, sacrifice (in any language) has nothing to do with judicial execution.

So, you believe that Hebrew priests, Aaron and the rest, were nothing but gussied up executioners and the Temple was a place of mass execution? Don't you have any sense of decency or reverence? Is there no insult you won't fling at God or what is holy to uphold your opinions?

I agree with Dave's demonstration that biblical faith includes both assent to revelation and trust, although NT "hope" may be a closer match to OT "emunah/faith." I overstated the case against faith as trust in the NT in an effort to stimulate discussion.

Yet, Dave's citations from the Bible do show, I think, that the NT sees faith primarily as assent to revelation. Faith as trust is more typical of the OT. That is because what was merely foreshadowed and promised in the OT was fully revealed in the New in Jesus Christ, so that one could move from a general trust in God's providence to a recognition that He has in fact accomplished what He had promised.

Trust in God's providence is appropriate when God has not revealed His will explicitly. So if we pray for something, we can trust that God will give it to us; but if God has revealed something, then it is not a matter of trust, but of assent (belief).

I wrote:"Again, faith is nothing more or less than assent to what God reveals. In fact, I would go so far as to say that trust, as Protestants understand it, is inconsistent with true faith."

This is true, in my opinion, when Protestants call on people to "trust" in what God has revealed (for example, that Jesus Christ "died for our sins and was raised for our justification"). No, one should "believe" this. The articles of faith call for assent, not trust. I don't see that Paul, say, "trusted" that Christ was "raised for our justification." He acknowledged that God had revealed this.

I should add, in support of my critique of Protestant trust/fiducia ("trust, as Protestants understand it, is inconsistent with true faith"), that the Council of Trent also condemned the "vain confidence (vana fiducia) of the heretics."

I should add, in support of my critique of Protestant trust/fiducia ("trust, as Protestants understand it, is inconsistent with true faith"), that the Council of Trent also condemned the "vain confidence (vana fiducia) of the heretics."

When it is conceived as the whole of what faith is, yes. My point in all my Bible passages (to be finished today: I got interrupted yesterday) is that faith involves both assent and trust: "both/and": and that it is wrong to reduce it to either bare assent or to trust alone.

"Faith alone" is incorrect insofar as it neglects the inherent place of works in the equation, overlooks the aspect of obedience, and formally separates sanctification from justification. It also (in Calvinism) denies the possibility of falling away, which is all over the Bible.

As I've always said, there is much more common ground on this than many on both sides seem to realize: especially when the question is looked at in practical, day-to-day Christian life terms.

But Adam and Eve, it seems to me are real historical people, the first created humans directly by God - to not believe that is serious danger - . . . Paul takes them as real history in I Timothy 2:11-16

I don't see anywhere, that Adomnan has denied this. Could you please document it? And if you discover that he didn't make such a ludicrous claim, then it seems that an apology and retraction is in order for such an outrageous claim about what someone supposedly believes.

On the other hand, if Adomnan believes as you claim (as he can verify, if so), then he is a flaming liberal, and that seems quite implausible. Looks like you sinmply engaged in more misrepresentation of your opponent's view. Perhaps you should ask yourself what accounts for such sloppiness, and how it can be avoided in the future, for the sake of your own credibility as a Protestant apologist?

--- Marcus Grodi (director of The Coming Home Network, and host of the EWTN television show: The Journey Home)

I highly recommend his work, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, which I find to be thoroughly orthodox, well-written, and effective for the purpose of making Catholic truth more understandable and accessible to the public at large.

God bless you in your indefatigable labors on behalf of the Faith! Only God knows how many lives your efforts have touched with the truth. . . . God bless you and give you joy and strength in persevering in your important ministry.

There is someone out there who says what I have to say much better than I ever could -- the smartest Catholic apologist I know of -- Dave Armstrong.

--- Amy Welborn (Catholic author and blogmaster)

I love your books, love your site, love everything you do. God bless you in your work. I'm very grateful for all you've done, and for all you make available. If someone pitches a hard question at me, I go first to your site. Then I send the questioner directly to the page that best answers the question. I know it's going to be on your site.

--- Mike Aquilina (Catholic apologist and author of several books)

People regularly tell me how much they appreciate your work. This new book sounds very useful. Your website is incredible and I recommend it regularly to new Catholics.

--- Al Kresta (Host of Kresta in the Afternoon [EWTN], author of Why Do Catholics Genuflect? and other books)

Dave Armstrong's book A Biblical Defense of Catholicism was one of the first Catholic apologetics books that I read when I was exploring Catholicism. Ever since then, I have continued to appreciate how he articulates the Catholic Faith through his blog and books. I still visit his site when I need a great quote or clarification regarding anything . . . Dave is one of the best cyber-apologists out there.--- Dr. Taylor Marshall (apologist and author of The Crucified Rabbi)

I love how Dave makes so much use of the Scriptures in his arguments, showing that the Bible is fully compatible with Catholicism, even more plausibly so than it is with Protestantism.. . . Dave is the hardest working Catholic apologist I know. He is an inspiration to me.

--- Devin Rose (apologist and author of The Protestant's Dilemma, 28 May 2012 and 30 Aug. 2013)Dave Armstrong['s] website is an amazing treasure trove representing hours–yea a lifetime of material gathered to defend Catholic doctrine. Over the years Dave has gathered the evidence for Catholic teaching from just about every source imaginable. He has the strength not only to understand the Catholic faith, but to understand the subtleties and arguments of his Protestant opponents.--- Fr. Dwight Longenecker (author and prominent blogmaster, 6-29-12)

You are a very friendly adversary who really does try to do all things with gentleness and respect. For this I praise God.--- Nathan Rinne (Lutheran apologist [LC-MS] )

You are one of the most thoughtful and careful apologists out there.

Dave, I disagree with you a lot, but you're honorable and gentlemanly, and you really care about truth. Also, I often learn from you, even with regard to my own field. [1-7-14]

--- Dr. Edwin W. Tait (Anglican Church historian)

Dave Armstrong writes me really nice letters when I ask questions. . . . Really, his notes to me are always first class and very respectful and helpful. . . . Dave Armstrong has continued to answer my questions in respectful and helpful ways. I thank the Lord for him.

--- The late Michael Spencer (evangelical Protestant), aka "The Internet Monk", on the Boar's Head Tavern site, 27 and 29 September 2007

Dave Armstrong is a former Protestant Catholic who is in fact blessedly free of the kind of "any enemy of Protestantism is a friend of mine" coalition-building . . . he's pro-Catholic (naturally) without being anti-Protestant (or anti-Orthodox, for that matter).

---"CPA": Lutheran professor of history [seehis site]: unsolicited remarks of 12 July 2005

I am reading your stuff since I think it is the most thorough and perhaps the best defense of Catholicism out there . . . Dave has been nothing but respectful and kind to me. He has shown me great respect despite knowing full well that I disagree with him on the essential issues.

Dave has been a full-time apologist for years. He’s done much good for thousands of people.

You have a lot of good things to say, and you're industrious. Your content often is great. You've done yeoman work over the decades, and many more people [should] profit from your writing. They need what you have to say.--- Karl Keating (founder and director of Catholic Answers, the largest Catholic apologetics organization in the world; 5 Sep. 2013 and 1 Jan. 2015)

Whether one agrees with Dave's take on everything or not, everyone should take it quite seriously, because he presents his arguments formidably.

I like the way you present your stuff Dave ... 99% of the time.--- Protestant Dave Scott, 4-22-14 on my personal Facebook page.

Who is this Dave Armstrong? What is he really like? Well, he is affable, gentle, sweet, easily pleased, very appreciative, and affectionate . . . I was totally unprepared for the real guy. He's a teddy bear, cuddly and sweet. Doesn't interrupt, sits quietly and respectfully as his wife and/or another woman speaks at length. Doesn't dominate the conversation. Just pleasantly, cheerfully enjoys whatever is going on about him at the moment and lovingly affirms those in his presence. Most of the time he has a relaxed, sweet smile.

--- Becky Mayhew (Catholic), 9 May 2009, on the Coming Home Network Forum, after meeting me in person.

Every so often, I recommend great apostolates, websites, etc. And I am very careful to recommend only the very best that are entirely Catholic and in union with the Church. Dave Armstrong’s Biblical Evidence for Catholicism site is one of those. It is a veritable treasure chest of information. Dave is thorough in his research, relentlessly orthodox, and very easy to read.

Discussions with you are always a pleasure, agreeing or disagreeing; that is a rarity these days.

--- David Hemlock (Eastern Orthodox Christian), 4 November 2014.

What I've appreciated, Dave, is that you can both dish out and take argumentative points without taking things personally. Very few people can do that on the Internet. I appreciate hard-hitting debate that isn't taken personally.

--- Dr. Lydia McGrew (Anglican), 12 November 2014.

Dave Armstrong is a friend of mine with whom I've had many discussions. He is a prolific Catholic writer and apologist. If you want to know what the Catholic Church really believes, Dave is a good choice. Dave and I have our disagreements, but I'll put my arm around him and consider him a brother. There is too much dishonesty among all sides in stating what the "other side" believes. I'll respect someone who states fairly what the other believes.

Recommended Catholic Apologetics Links and Icons

Protestantism: Critical Reflections of an Ecumenical Catholic

Orthodoxy & Citation Permission

To the best of my knowledge, all of my theological writing is "orthodox" and not contrary to the official dogmatic and magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church. In the event of any (unintentional) doctrinal or moral error on my part having been undeniably demonstrated to be contrary to the Sacred Tradition of the Catholic Church, I will gladly and wholeheartedly submit to the authority and wisdom of the Church (Matthew 28:18-20; 1 Timothy 3:15).

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